Boys’ basketball season is about to begin for the University Academy Gryphons.
This year’s team will be led by head coach Anthony Rashid and assistant coaches Jermaine Kemp and Dominique Outley, and they will hopefully lead UA to victories this season.
Basketball tryouts were the week after fall break. There was one tryout day, and after that players were notified about whether or not they made the team. From there, practice began, and players started conditioning every weekday plus Saturdays.
For this season, the boys’ basketball team includes six returning players. Half of them are seniors, and the other half are sophomores. The team also has 13 new players, with 11 of them being freshmen.
This year’s season schedule will be a challenge. UA’s first game is tomorrow against the Northeast High School Vikings. The game will be held at Northeast at 7 p.m. Throughout the course of the season, the Gryphons will participate in four tournaments. Another highlight of the season is that the team will be playing over winter break against the Kauffman Knights at the Hy-vee Arena. The date and time will be announced later.
UA freshman Harlin Washington is one of the new players on this year’s team. Washington said he has a game day routine that consists of “listening to music, specifically music that motivates me—music that makes you energized, music that you can feel in your chest.”
Washington has a pretty normal game day routine, and he also has his very own goals for the upcoming season.
“My expectations for this season are energy. I need my teammates to have a certain energy on the court. If we don’t have energy, we can’t play the game the way we want to,” Washington said.
Coach Rashid had some words of his own about his goals and expectations for this basketball season.
“I really try not to put expectations on things because they can lead to disappointment, but I do expect us to be a lot better than last year,” Coach Rashid said.
He is using last year as a starting point for improvement.
“Last year we had an underachieving season. I believe we now have the right players and experience to lead UA boys’ basketball in the right direction,” he said.
Coach Rashid is hoping to be .500 or better this year.
Everyone has a reason for why they enjoy certain things, some more complex and some more simple. For Washington, basketball is a bit more complex. It’s something he loves to do, and it has an impact on him.
“My family always used to play basketball, so I guess it was passed down. It impacted my life because I’ve learned a lot of lessons from basketball like consistency and structure,” he said.
Washington isn’t the only one who has been affected by basketball. Coach Rashid also has felt the impact of the game, not just as a coach but also as a player.
“Basketball is my self haven. It calms me down mentally. Basketball helps me a lot as a person. It helps me with my patience and many other life skills. Basketball took me places I never thought I would go,” he said.
That’s everything on the University Academy Gryphons boys’ basketball team for now. The team hopes you’ll come out and support them tomorrow or at the team’s first home game on Jan. 27 against Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy. Hopefully the boys will win to kick off the season and then keep building and improving throughout the year.
