SEASON PREVIEW
There is plenty of excitement heading into the 2023-24 basketball season because the Covington Buccaneers return a lot of experienced and talented players from a team that fielded a 6-17 record year ago.

Obviously, the overall record from last year wasn’t impressive, but the Buccaneers were young and lost eight of the 17 games by less than ten points.

Leading the Buccs under first-year coach Logan Carey will be a senior class who has bonded closely; Bryson Hite, Gunner Kimmel, Britton Miller, Sam Grabeman and Connor Humphrey.

Bryson Hite, Gunner Kimmel, Britton Miller and Connor Humphrey are all returning lettermen as well as juniors Brogen Angle and Tanner Palsgrove.

With the talent and experience Covington will put on the floor, what makes it most exciting is the Buccaneers have the potential to capture the first winning season for the program since the 2012-13 season where they finished 14-9.

Basketball is a team sport and Covington has a balanced roster as evident by the statistics a year ago where three players scored more than 200 points on the season. Brogen Angle led the Buccs with 287 points (12.5 avg.), Britton Miller had 271 points (11.8 anvil.) and Bryson Hite had 214 points (9.3 avg.).

Rebounding is another key to the game and the Buccaneers have players who crash the boards. Gunner Kimmel led the Buccs last season with 178 rebounds (7.7 avg.), Bryson Hite had 120 rebounds (5.2 avg.), Britton Miller had 109 rebounds (4.7 avg.) and Tanner Palsgrove had 81 rebounds (3.7 avg.).

Defensively, Tanner Palsgrove and Gunner Kimmel led the Buccs with 30 steals each a year ago, while Britton Miller had 26 steals and Bryson Hite had 25. Plus, Kimmel led the Buccs with 13 blocked shots and Hite had 12.

As always, the Buccaneers have a tough regular season schedule, which will hopefully prepare them for the post-season tournament. The toughest part of the schedule is in the conference – the TRC – where the Buccs will face seven solid programs twice during the season.

The biggest obstacles in challenging in the TRC will be Miami East and Troy Christian, who both shared the league title last season. The Vikings and Eagles return a boat-load of talent, while Northridge, Lehman, Milton-Union, Bethel and Riverside are all stiff challenges as well.