The start of another basketball season is quickly approaching. Everyone is back on campus and in class. Individual workouts will begin shortly and then it will not be long until the tip-off of the 2008-09 season.

We are excited about the upcoming season. It will not be easy to replace the departed Mickell Gladness, but we do return four starters. Most of those who follow SWAC Basketball have predicted that we will compete with Alabama State and Jackson State for the conference championship. Those predictions are nice, but we will to play hard and play smart basketball if we are going to have a chance to compete. The league should once again be very tough, from top to bottom and we will not look past anyone on our schedule.

I think this group learned a lot from last season. They learned how to overcome a lot of adversity, which can only help them during the 2008-09 campaign. There is no substitute for experience. Our players know what it will take.

Right now we are not getting ahead of ourselves. We are not thinking about regular season or conference tournament championships. The focus is on individual workouts and preparing for the start of full practice.

We hope to see you at Thomas M. Elmore Gymnasium this season. We look forward to your support for Alabama A&M Bulldogs Basketball! 

TOURNAMENT TIME
by Vann Pettaway

March 11, 2008

The regular season is complete. The postseason now begins.

We closed out the regular season on a strong note, winning six straight and 10-of-12. We overcame early-season adversity to finish in 11-7 in the SWAC. That was good enough for third place. Our win over Grambling, this past Saturday, raised our overall record to 14-14.

This team turned the corner when it really made a commitment to defense. Earlier in the season we were very inconsistent on the defensive end and that attributed to our lack of success. The loss of Cornelius Hester and Jonathan Inman to injury meant everyone would have to raise their level of play at both ends of the floor, especially on defense.

Right now this team is playing as well if not better defense than any of my previous teams, including our 2005 NCAA Tournament team.

Offensively we have continued to get contributions from everyone, but Trant Simpson has posted some big numbers, including 31 points in the regular-season finale. Additionally Mickell Gladness has continued to be a steady contributor, averaging nearly a double-double for the season.

Now the new season begins and this team is hungry. We will open with Arkansas-Pine Bluff, which beat us twice during the regular season. On Feb. 9 they defeated us, 70-65. That loss dropped our record to 7-13 overall and 4-6 in the league. We were in danger of not qualifying for the SWAC tournament.

We only lost one more game the rest of the way. Now we need to win three more games. That’s what it will take to win the SWAC tournament and advance to the NCAA Tournament.

FINISHING STRONG
by Vann Pettaway

March 6, 2008

We have had more then our share of adversity this season. Losing players to injury is always a challenge to overcome, but we lost two key starters.

We lost Cornelius Hester to an Achilles injury in early November. Just before Christmas we lost Jonathan Inman with a separated shoulder. Cornelius was our best perimeter player and Jonathan our best post player.

It would have been easy for the team to use those losses as an excuse. They knew even with a healthy team the SWAC would be quite a challenge this season. I am so proud of the way the team has endured and overcome those losses.

Now we head into the final weekend of the season riding a five-game winning streak. A win at home against Grambling would bring our record to .500 overall on the season.

The team has done a great job of meshing together. It took a while and if there was any silver lining it was the fact that the injuries occurred early in the season. We had plenty of time to adjust. Every coach wants to see his or her team playing their best basketball down the stretch so we knew we had plenty of time to get things in order.

Along the way we had to make some adjustments. Evan Hilton has stepped up and become one of our most consistent players. He’s posted a double-doubles and he has done a nice job blocking shots.

Trant Simpson has had some big games over the past few weeks. Our leading scorer had 33 points in a recent win over Alcorn, but he only had 6 points in our most recent game, a win over Jackson State.

That has been the theme throughout the season. One night it’s Evan. One night it’s Trant. Another night it’s a different player that has stepped up and made the difference.

We have a good 8-to-9-man rotation now and we are getting production from everyone. We are playing our best basketball of the season and that is a tribute to the hard work and dedication of this team.

But they know we still have plenty of work to left to do.

LEARNING PROCESS
by Vann Pettaway

December 23, 2007

We head into the Christmas break with a 3-6 record, which may not appear to be all that impressive, but I believe the first nine games have helped to prepare us for conference play.

The pre-Christmas schedule concluded Saturday with a tough 67-56 loss at Auburn. A week earlier we had a hard-fought 78-76 loss at Winston Salem State. Moral victories do not count in the standings, but the last two games did show the progress that this young team has made. It’s important to remember that this is a very young team. It’s a learning process for them and they have done a nice job of recognizing and understanding that process.

We had a big first-half lead at Winston Salem, but we were unable to sustain that advantage in the second half. Playing good basketball for 20 minutes or even 39 minutes is simply not good enough. They are starting to understand that it takes a sustained effort for an entire 40 minutes in order to be successful.

While we have progressed in many areas, we are still a little short of where I thought we would be at this point in time. Defensively we are doing a nice job, but that’s not the case on the offensive end. We need to do a much better job of shooting the basketball. Better patience and shot selection are essential. I am confident that we will shoot it better in the coming weeks.

Overall I do think our non-league schedule will get us ready for what will be another tough season in the SWAC. It’s often difficult for many to judge the overall quality of the league because of the competition our league members face in November and January.

For us the pre-conference schedule was two-fold. We wanted to be tested for conference play and we needed to support our renovation project in T.M. Elmore Gymnasium. We are in the process of replacing all of the seats in the lower level. We look forward to seeing all of the seats in the arena filled as we head into January and begin the march to the Southwestern Athletic Conference Tournament.

From everyone here at Alabama A&M, I want to wish all of you a safe and Happy Holiday season. God Bless.