Warming up for the winter at Camp Verde High School would be easier with all bodies available.
That is certainly how Mark Showers and Dan Wall, head girls and boys basketball coaches for the Cowboys, would prefer their teams catch fire heading into a stretch of five games, minimum, in five days to start the first full week of their seasons.
Minus the boys’ leading scorer and experienced depth for the girls, particularly at the wing, due to academic ineligibility, the teams still pulled out double-digit opening wins Nov. 24 at Mayer High School following easy victories Nov. 20 at CVHS in their season-opening scrimmages over Seligman High School.
Both teams look to ride the momentum from their wins over the Wildcats to at least two wins over Phoenix Country Day School. After the Cowboys host the Eagles on Tuesday, Dec. 1, they travel to Paradise Valley for a rematch at their place Friday, Dec. 4, as part of the two-day Desert Classic tournament. The girls will play the three other teams in their pool an hour before the boys do.
The biggest battle Wall has faced in the first month of his season has been winning without Javier Perez.
In the Nov. 24 absence of five players due to ineligibility, including the Cowboys’ senior guard and leading scorer, senior forward Jaysen Leonard stepped up to pour in 13 points to lead the Cowboys to a 51-40 win at Mayer.
The team’s only other senior, guard Thomas Herrera, added 12, while sophomore forward Ryan Loza had 11 and junior guard Ryan Cain scored seven points in the win.
“He’s improved a lot of stuff in the off-season,” Wall said. “He’s been finishing a little bit, playing a lot harder. I think he’ll give us some good minutes this year.”
Wall hopes at least seven of those players from the win at Mayer can step up and shoot better in support of Perez going into the rest of the season.
“We must have missed close to 20 layups,” Wall said. “We shot the ball horribly.”
The Cowboys, in fact, hit just one three-point shot out of 17 attempts and missed 11 of 19 shots from the free-throw line.
Wall expects experienced depth from five other players, including sophomore guard Chase Decker and junior forwards Reyes Herrera, Drake Smith, Aaron Tracy and Nick Westervelt to provide. Only Herrera contributed points at Mayer as the Cowboys scored just four points in the fourth quarter.
“The biggest thing we’ve got to fix is our decision-making,” Wall said. “Last year, we just couldn’t figure it out mentally to make the right plays, down the stretch. That’s where we see if we can get to the next level, the smarter we get as a team.”
Although Showers returns two senior starters, before last week, other players’ grades had prevented him from knowing whether or not he would even be able to put a junior varsity team on the court.
“Winter sports have been taking a pounding,” Wall said. “They got some extra girls that came out and did a great job, a couple girls got their grades up, so he’s excited.”
Just in time to double up Mayer, 48-24, five players returned, including vocal senior leader Dusty Dowdle. The sixth girl on last year’s team, junior Kayla Hackett, and senior Allee Drake all form a 5-foot, 9-inch front line across the forward positions, which will try to take the pressure off Gabby Ontiveros on the perimeter.
The 5-foot, 5-inch senior nailed six three-point shots and teamed up with her smaller freshman sister, Hope, to score 30 points in the win at Mayer. Hope Ontiveros scored all 12 of her points in a second half that saw the Wildcats score only five points after trailing by just two going into the locker room.
Showers hopes to see consistent production from 5-foot, 6-inch Nieja Garner, who was a top-three scorer as a sophomore forward last season at Mingus Union High School before ineligibility prematurely ended her season as well.
