Subscribe
Community
Future of the Hawks
CSM men's basketball team looks to improve during the 2008-09 campaign
Friday, Dec. 12, 2008
|
| ||
|
E-Mail This Article
The main goal for the College of Southern Maryland Hawks men's basketball team and the coaching staff is to bring the program back to major prominence it once had in the 1980s.
From 1983 to 1987, the Hawks, who were formerly Charles County Community College, won four Maryland JUCO national division championships under former head coach John Mappas.
During those four seasons, the Hawks won 20 games or more and were one of the most dominant junior college teams in not just the state, but the nation. Since then, CSM's last winning season was when it was 16-12 in the 2003-04 season under former head coach Todd Fong. But, this season the coaching staff feels that after a full year of recruiting, the Hawks have probably one of the best teams assembled in 10 years.
"This season so far has been a up and down year for the program," said second-year head coach Alan Hoyt, a former Great Mills High School standout who won a SMAC title in 2000. "I'm trying to teach the kids to just play basketball and focus on the basics and fundamentals."
The Hawks have started the season 4-9 overall, and 1-4 in conference play, recently falling to Lackawanna on Tuesday by double digits. Their key wins have come against the St. Mary's junior varsity, Tidewater and Baltimore Community College. The Hawks lost the Allegany on Oct. 21, 61-59, in a conference battle.
"This year, I felt that the game against Allegany showed what we are capable of doing," Hoyt said. "We were up and felt like that game could have boosted our energy."
"Allegany is a powerhouse," said second-year assistant coach Tim Bowie, a 2002 graduate of La Plata High School and former CSM basketball standout. "That was a tough loss for our guys since we were ahead for over half of the game. The season has been back and forth. We have our rocky starts, but we've been in every game and the players really come to work everyday."
The Hawks are loaded this year with three former All-SMAC performers in Chris Brown (Lackey), Troy Cummings (McDonough) and Saquan Brown (Thomas Stone) who all have the ability to score at any given time. The team has four returners on the roster in sophomores Laron Mann and Byron Morgan that both knock down the three-point shot consistently. During the 2007-08 campaign, Mann put up two 30-point games and received third-team All-Region JUCO honors.
Bowie added: "We've shown that we can play with the powers of our strong conference and I think the program is showing a leap in the right direction."
With nine recruits on the roster, the Hawks are definitely building for the future, but the main emphasis for most of the players is experience. What Hoyt brings to the table is certainly previous college experience from when he played basketball for McDaniel College in Westminster. Hoyt graduated in 2004 with an exercise science degree.
"I wasn't the most athletic on the floor," Hoyt said of his college days. "But, I was always wanted to be the smartest player on the floor, and that's what I want to forward to my players about knowing game situations."
With being so undersized the Hawks possess more athleticism than the other teams, the focus from the coaching staff is simply up-tempo play and creating offensive turnovers, which will create easy fast break points.
According to Bowie, what the team lacks is a key distributor at the point guard position. Last season Carlton Williams, gone to graduation, was 13th in the nation in assists and was the tone setter for the offense.
The biggest hurdles for the Hawks will be boxing out, rebounding, and taking care of the ball, in which they are seemingly improving on.
"This year's team has a great skill level, but I wish we had a leader for assists," Bowie said. "We just have to figure out how to fill roles, so if we do that we will become a better team."
The fan base at CSM is steadily growing for the Hawks during home games thus far and there will be numerous events for the program.
On Dec. 19, the Hawks will host the Coaches vs. Cancer game against Prince George's Community College, in which they will raise money through January from raffles and T-shirt sales that will go to the cause.
"Our goals are to get back on track," added Hoyt. "Right now, we are relying on our talent and teams are out working us. We want to make it to nationals and the key is improving every day."
