The Aberdeen Christian boys’ basketball team will look very familiar to last year as the Knights return four starter from their seventh place squad at the State B Tournament.

Coach Matt Rohrbach said that familiarity has already paid dividends for the team this campaign.

“Every year has its challenges and every year has its excitement. Last year was kind of fun to send the seniors out the right way,” Rohrbach said. “The biggest takeaway I’ve had even in just the last few days of practice is, last year we were still getting to know each other at this time. We were still trying to figure out what kind of basketball team we were going to be. What everybody’s role is going to be, and then they had to understand how I was going to coach and my expectations for them.”

That is not the case this season. It has allowed the Knights to pick up where they left off last year.

“We’re really just focused on getting better and competing,” Rohrbach said, “winning the day.”

Returning starters from last year are all-state junior Brooks Jett, along with Jett Johnson, Luke Kaiser, and Dylan Hofer (fresh off a state championship in the triple jump at last spring’s state track and field meet).

Additional help will come from Grady Jett and Raymond Rodriquez-Martinez, along with Lloyd Smith Wade and Charles Eichler.

Rohrbach said there are nine total freshman out for basketball, and he expects the competition to be intense in practice for coveted varsity spots.

“It’s exciting to see them compete and go after it,” Rohrbach said.

Look for a face-paced attack from the Knights this season.

“I want to play fast, I know that,” Rohrbach said, “and they want to play fast, too.”

Christian opens its season on Tuesday, Dec. 16 by hosting Warner at the Aberdeen Civic Arena.

While the landscape appears set for another big season for the Knights, Rohrbach is not one to look too far down the road.

“I know last year, we didn’t want to go 15-5 in the regular season. Obviously, we wanted to go 20-0, and the reality is you never take something for granted,” Rohrbach said. “You never take a practice for granted or a game for granted. That’s got to be our minsdset.”

And while the Knights might feel some pressure of being favored in many of their games, Rohrbach views pressure much differently than others.

“I feel like if we don’t get to the point where we handle each other’s pressure, because the pressure should happen in practice in my mind, the pressure should be from the underclassmen breathing on the upperclassmen’s back and upperclassmen showing the underclassmen that they’re not there yet,” Rohrbach said. “That’s the pressure that I want to see. And that molds and grows everybody to be the right kind of team that we want to be.”

Rohrbach is not about to get caught up in talking about long-range goals and the possibilities that could await his team this season.

“We really don’t talk about state tournament, we don’t talk about conference, we don’t talk about regions, we don’t even talk about a game that’s three days away,” he said. “We talk about the next day. We’ll go through scouting report the day before a game, but that’s about the extent of what we do for the next team.”