City of Basketball Love

Zach Drapkin (@ZachDrapkin)
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(Ed. Note: This story is part of CoBL’s “Prepping for Preps” series, which will take a look at many of the top high school programs in the region as part of our 2016-17 season preview coverage. The complete list of schools previewed so far can be found here.)

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Last season, Cheltenham’s Trevonn Pitts experienced organized basketball for the first time.

The athletic 6-foot-3 wing had toyed around with the idea of joining the Panthers’ basketball squad in each of his first two years at the school, but never went through with it; when he finally did, the junior was an instant hit, throwing down a monster dunk in the season opener and ultimately averaging 12 points and eight rebounds per game on the varsity level.

This year, head coach John Timms has entrusted Pitts with leading his talented bunch of inexperienced but talented Panthers to battle.

Pitts is still settling into his role as a leader, let alone as one of the team’s key playmakers.

“He’s still learning how to be a leader while learning the game of basketball,” Timms said. “He has welcomed that role, he has taken on that role, but he’s still growing in that role.”

Pitts  is one of the team’s few returning components from last season, with more than half a dozen graduated seniors -- including PSU-Harrisburg’s Khalil White and Elizabethtown’s Justin Sutton -- as well as one expected contributor’s removal from the program accounting for most of the team production in 2015-16.

“There are not a lot of players on the team this year that have varsity minutes, so we have to get used to that,” Pitts said. “Once we get comfortable, we should be pretty good.”

Pitts will have another senior with substantial varsity playing time under his belt alongside him in Academy New Church transfer Tim Spencer, a 5-11 guard who co-captained ANC as a junior and was part of a mass exodus from that program this offseason.

Spencer, Pitts says, lightens the load on him as a leader, given that he provides the team with a “second voice” and “good energy.”

“For Tim, it’s a little difficult transferring in as a senior to lead a bunch of guys who were sophomores on the varsity team but didn’t play and are looking for their opportunity to start as juniors and somehow step into that role,” Timms said.

Timms is banking on the hungry juniors he mentioned to really break out this season and step up to their elevated roles with splendor.

It’s a pretty deep junior class, featuring the likes of 6-4 Jack Clark and 6-3 Rodney Carson on the wings as well as 5-10 Ahmad Bickley at point and 6-5 Lonce Scott at center. Amir Lewis, a 6-3 guard, was a productive member of the rotation last year, but Timms said he’s been suspended from the team “indefinitely” and will not return this season.

Clark is a tall and lanky sharpshooter, while Carson is a speedy and athletic transition player. They both have lofty expectations heading into the season, and Timms believes they are up for the task.

“I think they’re varsity ready although they played limited varsity minutes,” Timms said. “It was just the fact that Khalil White was in front of both of those guys, and he logged in pretty much 28 minutes of a 32-minute game.”

The team dynamic has changed significantly as a result of the departures of White and the 6-4 Sutton who posed a threat in the post for the Panthers last season.

With Sutton gone and no clear option to replace his impact in the paint offensively, the approach shifts to a less-restrictive, faster-paced style of basketball.

“We’ve become a little faster on offense, which in some ways allows the younger guys a little more freedom,” Timms said. “It’s less restricted, the offense, so that the guys don’t have to think as much while playing.”

To fit that approach, Timms will be going with an eight-to-nine man rotation of Pitts, Spencer, Bickley, Clark, Scott, and an array of guards alternating in and out of the starting lineup.
Sophomore Tim Myarick (6-3), whose brother Chris plays football at Temple, is a left-handed shooter who Timms says will see a lot of minutes this season. Carson and 6-1 senior Nadir Slocum should also see time on the court.

Cheltenham will be a very talented shooting team this season, but with so much youth and inexperience, turnovers are imminent.

“This year, I think we’re going to create a game where it’s fast so they don’t want to think about their mistakes,” Timms said. “They’re going to happen. We just want to move on to the next play.”

On defense, the Panthers pride themselves on the variety of looks they give opponents, switching between defenses over the course of every game.

The team’s overall speed and athleticism will make defensive ball pressure a strength this season, and that translates to takeaways and transition plays, which mean more chances for the offense to put points on the board.

If all goes well, Cheltenham will be looking for another shot at dethroning budding rivals Plymouth-Whitemarsh atop the Suburban One League’s American Division. The Panthers are 1-5 against P-W since Timms took over.

“We have to win a couple more times, and then I think I would label it a rivalry,” said Timms. “P-W is king of the hill. We’re still climbing, trying to get up to that mountaintop.”