For PC men, less is more
With 7 men in uniform, Pirates learn to persevere
The Porterville College men’s basketball team, which dresses just seven healthy players these days, successfully added to the team this season through subtraction.
The journey has been turbulent, but Porterville emerged as a team that enjoys playing with each other much more than before.
Greg Shaw, Lamont Jones and Ricky Stokes, all 6-foot5 or taller, are no longer with the squad. Their d is - missal in early January from the program was the result of them not completely buying into head coach Rob Haynes’ program and creating distractions for the team.
“I’d rather have the seven guys we have now than the 12 we had in the beginning,” for- mer Granite Hills High School superstar Kilon Bradford said. “There was a lot of just unnecessary stuff going on.”
“It’s been a challenging season,” Haynes said. “It’s been humbling.”
Sophomore Dale Kirkland tore a knee ligament early in the season (he will return to PC next year), so without the aforementioned four, Porterville’s roster was thinned to eight players in January. Forward Tyler Roberts has missed several games recently with a balky knee and Haynes is unsure if he’ll suit up Wednesday at College of the Sequoias, so that gives the Pirates seven healthy bodies.
At practice sessions there are other players who will join the team next season, including former Porterville High School contributor Eli Mascorro and redshirt guard Shaquille Barker, but they can’t help the Pirates during games.
Minus five players, who were all 6-foot-4 or taller, Porterville has been forced to tinker with its playing style, turning it into a run-and-gun small-ball operation. The Pirates sometimes now throw five guards onto the floor, creating a match- up nightmare for opposing teams.
“We went small ball,” Haynes said. “Thus far it actually helps us a lot. From the offensive perspective, if you man us, their bigs have a disadvantage. If you zone us we have five guys who can all shoot it [from three]. Pick your poison.”
The Pirates are shooting 43.1 percent from three-point land during Central Valley Conference (CVC) play this season and 47.6 percent overall. They’ve also averaged 79.8 points per game in eight games of CVC play.