Following an enjoyable Thanksgiving holiday weekend, it's finally time for some high school basketball. I've completed a preview for the upcoming 2010-2011 season, which is available in its entirety at the Prep Talk blog.
Portions of the preview will be featured here as posts in the coming days, beginning tomorrow.
I did my best to include as many schools as possible in the preview, but unfortunately I wasn't able to touch on every school in WNY. My apologies to anyone left out. Also, only returning varsity players were featured. If you know of any impact players who are new to the varsity level, please tell us about them on the main event post.
My favorite part of writing a preview is making preseason predictions and putting them in print. In a post tomorrow, we will take a look back at how the predictions from the 2009-2010 preview went.
Let me know your thoughts in the comments section below, after you've finished reading the new preview at Prep Talk.
-centercourt
Overall a good job Center Court hopefully u will never lose last year's Sectional Program : )
2 things in all this stood out. The part about Buff State will b out of pizza by halftime during every game of the Sectionals. AND your prediction of Olean not winning a 5th straight Class B title which I must say is a lock since u also note that they move UP to Class A this year. HA! C everyone tomorrow!
Posted by: McShea is God | Sunday, November 28, 2010 at 11:32 PM
Olmsted now has a varsity team competing in the Yale Cup. It will be a Class D classification for the playoffs. Their head coach is Mike Webster.
Posted by: BullsFan | Monday, November 29, 2010 at 09:09 AM
As with the Harvard Cup, the Yale Cup is changed for the 2010-11 school year. There are 2 divisions: large school (Bennett, McKinley, East, Riverside, Hutch Tech, South Park, Burgard and Lafayette), and small school (Grover, Seneca, OTC, City Honors, Performing Arts, Emerson and Olmsted). I am not sure how the Yale Cup will be determined, or if it will be awarded at all. Teams will play each team in their division twice, so the best teams in the city may not meet. It will help with the larger schools' power rankings, though.
Posted by: Earl Schunk | Monday, November 29, 2010 at 10:48 AM
MIG -
I'm glad you can appreciate the Olean prediction. Another one I forgot to include was my prediction that McKinley will fail to reach A-1 finals for the first time since 2005.
Posted by: centercourt | Monday, November 29, 2010 at 11:36 AM
HUGE BATTLE TODAY!!!!! #1 vs. #2 in CC's top ten large school poll. Will. South at St. Joes. Could decide absolutely nothing as they play again on Wed. at South and its only a scrimmage. Oh yeah I guess these kinds of things matter to some. Great job again CC, see you tonight.
Posted by: jackherlan | Monday, November 29, 2010 at 12:45 PM
I am surprised no one has mentioned Frontier adding to the competition in Div 1. They looked strong during the summer. They were competitive last season and return an Empire Games player (dont bring up Empire games). Look for them to be in the middle of that Division.
Posted by: notjustagame | Monday, November 29, 2010 at 06:57 PM
I agree Frontier will add to the competition in ECIC I. They are always well coached and Darius Edwards should be one of the top players in the area. Jamestown, Clarence, Will North, Frontier, OP...ECIC I could be very interesting once again.
Posted by: centercourt | Tuesday, November 30, 2010 at 11:19 AM
Willie Jakes actually isn't at Medina anymore, so it will be essentially an entirely different team than last year.
Posted by: medinahoops1 | Tuesday, November 30, 2010 at 11:22 AM
Thanks for that. I actually just heard about that last night. I was told he went to Albion, but I'm not sure if he's playing this year.
Posted by: centercourt | Tuesday, November 30, 2010 at 11:32 AM
No, I don't think he is. There were some transfer issues that I think would've kept him out.
Posted by: medinahoops1 | Thursday, December 02, 2010 at 10:56 AM
I hereby renounce the "aka ........." part of my screen name. Apparently CC thinks he's just a regular Joe, of course we all know better, and has made a special request that I drop it. So it's done.
Just a couple things worth following this year.
1. How will Will South fare without play maker extraordinaire Mark Coppola? I think they'll be darn good with a goodly number of seniors returning, but sharp shooter Joe Licata won't find as many open looks.
2. How about Sweet Home without Paul Schintzius patrolling the sidelines? Won't be the same. He will be sorely missed.
3. Will be weird to watch Grover without King Earl on the sidelines. Fortunately we can still catch his comedic act this year, just with a different team.
As I like to do every year, all the best to all of the teams, players and coaches. have fun. Your time on the high school hardwood is all too short!
Posted by: hoopster | Saturday, December 04, 2010 at 12:21 AM