Wildcat Men Set for Second Half of Basketball Season
Published 01.06.2006
The Pennsylvania College of Technology men's basketball team will have a different look and approach when it steps onto the court Saturday to start the second half of its season.
Craig Flint, a 6-foot-1 freshman guard from Port Allegany, and Tom Little, a 6-4 freshman forward from Woodland Regional, Conn., will be in the starting lineup, replacing Preston Peterson (Williamsport) and Nick Reynolds (Athens) who are no longer on the team. Another player gone from the squad after the semester break is Lou Roskowski (Bishop Neumann).
Little and Flint will join Tony Flint, Craig's older brother, a 6-foot senior guard from Port Allegany; Matt Michaels, a 6-foot junior guard from Williamsport, and Matt Melusky, a 6-4 junior center from Minersville. Through the team's first 12 games, Melusky was the leading scorer with a 14.1-points-per-game average. Reynolds had averaged 10.5 points and Peterson 9.6 points per game.
"It's definitely going to make it different. It hurts our inside game, there's no question about that. But I've been here (in this situation) before and you've just got to make some adjustments," said Penn College coach Gene Bruno. "I'm probably going to have to go to a perimeter offense now, more-so than punching it inside all the time. It's probably going to hurt our trapping game, also," Bruno said.
The Wildcats are 5-7 overall, having lost their last four games all to NCAA Division III opponents, but are 5-1 in the Penn State University-Athletic Conference. They host Penn State Beaver at 3 p.m. Saturday at Bardo Gym in a PSUAC game that will end an 18-day layoff and that Bruno calls "huge."
"(A win) would put us two games up on Beaver as we try to hold onto second place," the coach said.
"I think we can be competitive... But I think we're going to run into some trouble because of size and lack of rebounding. We're making adjustments to do what we can do defensively and offensively," Bruno added. "I think we're building and my young kids are getting a wealth of experience."