Eagle boys look to continue winning

Uniontown’s boys finished third in the Three Rivers League last season, going 8-2 against league foes and 14-7 overall.

With three seniors and six letterwinners returning, the Eagles were voted sixth in a pre-season coaches’ poll. But that’s not necessarily because they expect a drop off from Uniontown. The league got a bit tougher with the admission of Southeast, picked to finish fourth, and defending champion Jayhawk-Linn was picked third behind Yates Center and St. Paul.

Head coach Jeremy Neville has 20 players, including five juniors. Ben George (6’ 3”, Sr.), a First Team All-TRL pick last season, is among the returning letterwinners along with Gavin Fry (6’ 0”, Sr.), Jez Simpson (5’ 11”, Jr.), Chance Fuhrman (5’ 9”, Jr.), Andrew Reed (5’ 10”, Jr.) and Luke George (5’ 9”, Soph.).

“I feel like we have a tough, disciplined group of six,” Neville says. “Ben George is one of the better players in Southeast Kansas and I believe he is on a mission. We will have the capability to take advantage of matchups in a variety of ways.”

Ben George can play either guard or forward. Simpson, Fuhrman and Luke George are guards while Fry and Reed are forwards.

Neville is looking to a slew of players to step up and provide depth on the varsity level. Among them are senior Sheldon Bailey (5’ 5”), juniors Tydas Lawrence (6’ 3”) and Brendan Atkins (6’ 1”), and freshmen Drew Perry (5’ 4”), Jake Harvey (5’ 10”), Clay Sutterby (6’ 3”), Cade Goodridge (5’ 6”), Hunter Schaaf (5’ 10”) and Drew Holt (5’ 6”).

“Depth and a lack of size are concerns,” Neville says. “We need to play efficiently on both ends of the floor.”

This group is also expected to continue the upward trend of Uniontown basketball, which has won 14 games each of the past two seasons. That came after three seasons in which the Eagles won a total of 23 games.

“Our program is continuing to move forward in a positive manner,” Neville says. “We graduated a successful group of seniors who lead us to a 28-15 record over the past two seasons. This group understands the tradition that is being built and what they need to do to be successful.”

The Eagles will open the season Friday night with a TRL game at Marmaton Valley. This is the only meeting scheduled with the Wildcats this season (unless they meet in the Pleasanton Tournament) as the normal mid-year slot was changed to allow new TRL member Southeast to get onto the Eagles’ schedule.