Apaches set for new heights with taller athletes

GONZALES — It’s a cliché but in high school basketball it rings true. You can’t teach height.

The Gonzales Apaches under new head coach Derek Williams were winless in district last season, with players averaging less than six-feet tall. Now the Apaches are revamping with young talent and Williams is not only ready for the opportunity but excited to show off his numbers both in height and number of athletes participating in the sport.

“The numbers are high,” Williams noted as a main difference between the start of last year versus this year. “When I got here there were no freshmen, barely any junior varsity kids and they finished with four kids on varsity. Last year I had 15 on varsity, but I had about seven or eight on JV and I had a good number of freshmen kids.”

Now the Apaches have 22 freshmen kids, with about 15 of them purely basketball athletes. Meanwhile the junior varsity numbers are a mixture of football and basketball players, so “the numbers are high” as Williams mentioned.

“Now we have to get those kids that are out here to learn basic basketball fundamentals. So now I feel like I’m getting them to like it, now I got to get them all to learn it and that’s where we’re at.”

As for the added height, Williams touted one of his youngsters as a key addition to the varsity squad this year.

“Number one would be Trevion McNeil,” Williams said. “We’re expecting big things. I know he’s just a sophomore but I don’t think he put a basketball down [all] summer. I think he went to two or three different camps, he even came to our camp and every time you looked up he was in the gym. We’re expecting big things from him. I think this guy, the sky’s the limit for him. If we can get that harnessed right I think he’s a guy that scouts will come back and start looking at him.”

Williams recounted a story when McNeil went to San Antonio this summer and was complimented on his build.

“A lot of people said he looked like Kevin Durant, so I know that’s a big compliment for a sophomore kid that didn’t play a whole lot last year when we moved him up but he did do really well with the freshmen and I thought he dominated at [that] level. We’re going to ask a lot of that from him.”

McNeil is listed as a six-footer for the Apaches.

Another player Williams has an eye on is senior Roger Reyna, who comes in at 6’5”.

“If we can just keep him straight, I think he’ll be another plus that can help us,” Williams said.

“Roger Reyna is a guy who plays a lot in the park, but this will be his first year playing organized basketball.”

Another piece to the puzzle is junior Aaron Hunt, he is a returner from last year’s team. Hunt has already shown that his quickness on the football field translates on the basketball court.

“I think the sky’s the limit for this kid too,” Williams noted. “There’s nobody quicker. He has unlimited range in his shooting. But right now what we’re trying to get him to understand is if he’s going to be a leader he’s got to have them following. That’s what we’ve been missing here for a very long time. An athlete that when you say team captain people believe in him.”

Those three are going to play a big role for the new-look Apaches this season as well as a “wild card” as Williams calls him in Cody Calzada.

“[Calzada] is long,” he said. “He might be six foot but he has the longest arms I’ve ever seen.”

“Now you’re looking at long, lanky basketball players on the floor that can get up and get down,” Williams said of his team.

Looking at the district Gonzales is in, the teams who go far in the playoffs are those with height. Wimberley and La Vernia have players over 6’5” while Cuero has a player who is 6’10”.

“I [had] Alyas [Ramirez] playing center in district play and you’re just not going to compete,” Williams said of last year’s team.

But now that they have what he believes is the necessary height, the Apaches are now working on doing something that hasn’t been done in about five years.

“These young guys are hungry,” Williams said. “They want their number on that banner and that’s what we’re trying to fight to. It stopped at 2011 and we haven’t had anything since 2011. Haven’t made the playoffs, haven’t won a district game in two or three years. Something has to give. So I’m going to break my back to make sure it can happen because these kids deserve it. We just got to get them to work hard.”

One final change that’s noticeable on the sideline is the addition of Joel Sifuentes to the coaching staff. Sifuentes brings a different style of offense to Williams’ usual way of thinking, but is a much-needed piece to the program.

“I think he is going to make a huge impact on this program,” Williams said. “One reason is we’re from different areas. One of the areas I’ve come from is I like to get the ball up and down the floor and spread it out and run a lot of isolation, where he has been is in this area. He has a better feel for the type of players that are in this area. They might not be as fast and they might not be as quick so he wants to bring in a type of game where it’s a lot of flex ran and a lot of screens to help some of those players get to the bucket.”

“So that’s the biggest change is that he’s been with these type of kids and with both of us putting that together it’s going to be a huge factor of what’s going on here. So it’s been a blessing that I got a coach like that. It’s always good to bring in a system but to have somebody have a different ideal and also help with you the type of kids you got because he’s been in this area, it’s helped out tremendously. It’s been 100 percent positive that this guy is here.”

The Apaches basketball program still has a ways to go, but with their added youth and dedication to the sport, Gonzales is on that path towards success, hopefully a path that leads to the calling them the “Running Apaches” once again.