They may not be strong in total numbers, but the Aberdeen Roncalli Cavaliers will make up for that in quality depth in girls’ basketball this year.
“We’ve got 13 kids out 9-12, so numbers are a little low,” said Roncalli coach Derek Larson. “I think the talent of those kids is pretty high.”
The Cavaliers will feature a different look this season, trying to take advantage of that superior depth instead of playing limited players for nearly an entire game.
“As we told our kids, the days of people playing 30 minutes a game is probably done,” Larson said. “We have a lot of athletes, a lot of people that can get up and down the floor. For that, again we’re going to have to play a lot of people.”
While the Cavaliers return a pair of starters and some other girls with varsity experience, Larson doesn’t get caught up in that, knowing that plenty of people will see many minutes on the floor this campaign.
“In my opinion it doesn’t matter who you start, because the next four or five you bring in are just as good as the people you have that are going to start,” Larson said. “So, we’ll play a lot more than we have in the past. We’re a lot deeper than we have been in the past.”
Claire Crawford and Rylee Voeller started for the Cavaliers last year, while Jillian Ellwein was a starter for Leola-Frederick a year ago before transferring in the off season.
Others who saw major minutes include Morgan Helms and Gabby Thomas.
“I think there’s some other people that I think will surprise a lot of people, that didn’t see a lot of minutes last year that will step into big roles this year,” Larson said. “Even though they maybe played, I call 30-30 players, they play when we were up 30 or down 30. Everyone has been in that scenario and we’re going to have a lot of new people this year step out of that role and maybe into a lot more extensive role with the varsity team.”
Of course one thing that will not change with the Cavaliers is their defensive intensity. In fact, with the added depth, look for Roncalli to apply even more pressure defense than it has in the past.
“Kind of like we’ve always done. We want to win games on the defensive end,” Larson said. “If you stick around practice long enough, that’s what we harp more than anything is playing on the defensive end, and being intense on the defensive end, just kind of getting after people, creating some mismatches and just making it hard for other teams.”
Roncalli gets an early start on its season, playing Northwestern on the road Friday night to open the season.
Larson is excited about the upcoming year.
“We have a lot of athletes,” he said, “we’ve just go to get them in the right spots.”
The Cavaliers have been on the door step of advancing to the state tournament the past few seasons, just falling one game short. That goal of getting to state remains the same, regardless of the personnel.
“Our goal every year is to make the state tournament. We haven’t been there for a while now,” Larson said. “Lost in the Sweet 16 games the last couple years in a row. We don’t mention a lot about postseason early in the year. … I don’t care who graduated or who’s back, that is our expectaction. Now we just need to rise to the occasion.”
Roncalli had a quality volleyball season and fell short in the SoDak 16 last month. A good share of those athletes are also on the basketball squad.
“We want to continue that success that they had in volleyball, again them making the Sweet 16 the last couple years just like we did in basketball. We want to continue that success and then hopefully expand that success in the state tournament,” Larson said. “These guys again, like the Elyana Roach of the world, didn’t play any real varsity minutes in volleyball last year and comes out and she’s an all-conference player this year. Hoping for her to kind of do the same thing this year (in basketball), also.”
Look for the Cavaliers to come at opponents in waves, substituting multiple players on multiple occasions throughout a game.
“That’s our intent is to play three minutes at a time or four minutes at a time and not have to play extensive minutes like we have in the past,” Larson said, “and get people in and out, and making sure people are full speed and full strength the whole time they’re in.”
The key to this year’s depth, is Larson said there is no drop off in talent or ability no matter who is on the floor for the Cavaliers.
“On any given day you pick five and you pick a different five and then one team can win,” Larson said, “and the next day you can rematch them, a different team could win.”
The goal of which is pretty simple for the upcoming season.
“Hopefully, playing those smaller minutes and more kids should lead into success,” Larson said.
