YSU basketball team’s cupboard is not bare

Two stars are gone, but YSU returns four players with starting experience.

By PETE MOLLICA

VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF

YOUNGSTOWN — When the Youngstown State men’s basketball team begins practice for the 2007-08 season this weekend, there won’t be a Quinn Humphrey or a Keston Roberts on the floor.

Those two combined to average more than half the points the Penguins scored a year ago and they’ve graduated, but third-year head coach Jerry Slocum certainly isn’t facing a bare cupboard.

“This is always an exciting time of the year,” said Slocum. “And there is a lot of questions about this team that still need to be answered.”

Slocum will definitely miss the play of Humphrey and Roberts along with their leadership, but he’s been through this before.

“In all my years of coaching [33rd season] I’ve had a lot of good players graduate and we’ve been fortunate to have good players come in and take their place,” he said.

Slocum will have three starters returning along with a fourth who shared starting duties last season.

He also has four other returning lettermen and six new faces, which he feels will definitely play a key role in the upcoming season.

The returning starters are led by 6-2 senior Byron Davis, the team’s point guard who averaged 8.6 points and nearly four assists per game.

Junior Jack Liles, a 6-7, 240 pound forward, averaged 7.4 points and 6.4 rebounds a year ago, while seniors Dwight Holmes (6-6 forward) and John Barber (6-6 forward) combined to average more than 10 points and six rebounds a game.

The other returning lettermen include senior George Cotol (6-5 guard), juniors Mikko Niemi (6-2 guard) and Jack Rebillot (6-6 forward) and sophomore Alek Mrozek (6-7 guard).

Slocum is very excited about his recruiting class for this season.

“It’s the first time since I’ve been here that we’ve got a freshman class that we feel can really step in and help us this season,” Slocum said. “And I feel that we are going to need each and every one of them.”

The three freshman recruits were all standouts in high school, led by Kennedy Catholic High and Youngstown native Blair Rozenblad, a 6-3 guard, who was second team all-state a year ago.

He’s joined by 6-8 freshman forward Dan Boudler, a first team All-State selection at Renaissance High School in Detroit and 6-7 freshman Vytas Sulskis, a Lithuanian native who played at The Rock High School in Florida and was the Florida Class 1A player of the year.

Also in this class are two junior college transfers: 6-5 junior Gemayle Johnson, who averaged 19.8 points a game for Montgomery CC last season and 6-5 junior Kevin Draughon, who averaged 12.5 points and 6.3 rebounds for Monroe Community College.

Another newcomer was with the Penguins all last season in 6-0 redshirt freshman Vance Cooksey, who sat out the season meeting academic requirements.

The Penguins also have another local player on the roster in 6-0 freshman walk-on Mychal Doblanski, who was a standout at Liberty High a year ago.

Slocum is excited about opening the season against UCLA and also having a game at Notre Dame. YSU opens the season against the Bruins on Nov. 12 in the 2007 O’Reilly Auto Parts CBE Classic in Los Angeles, Calif.

“I’m excited about the opportunity to go to that historic site and it will be a great challenge for our team,” he said. “The characteristics of this team we did not have last year. This team will pass the ball better, see the floor better and will have a stronger inside presence then we’ve had before.

“This is also a team that won’t be a finished product early in November, but by the time league play begins in January we’ll have a chance to be a pretty good team.”