Chippewa Valley boys hoops team eyes turnaround By Jon Malavolti The team was sitting on a 5-5 overall record and 0-4 mark in the Macomb Area Conference Red Division at press time. “We keep working; we don’t give up,” Voss said before a Jan. 21 practice. “We’ve got 10 games to play plus the tournament, and we’re looking to finish as strong as we can finish, and I think we will.” Voss had plenty of reasons to be optimistic looking ahead — the first being the experience his squad gained and the lessons it learned over the first half of the schedule. “We do have a pretty inexperienced team,” the coach said. “It’s not for lack of effort, nothing like that. They’re a bunch of really good kids, and they have worked pretty doggone hard. It’s just that our learning curve hasn’t happened as fast as we hoped.” It didn’t help that the Big Reds lost their most veteran player, senior Christian Fincher, for the first few weeks of the season. Voss said he saw some “marked improvement” in a Jan. 20 50-49 loss to Romeo — a game in which Fincher played his best since returning to the lineup. “I think we’re on the way back,” Voss said. “I think our future looks brighter as we move on.” Fincher said he’s glad to be back and was “very anxious” sitting out the first portion of the season while recovering from offseason knee surgery. “I’m not used to sitting on the bench for so long,” he said. “I’ve been really eager to get back. It just really motivated me to really go at it with my training, get myself back on the court.” Fincher’s return has had an immediate impact on the Big Reds’ play in the paint. “It’s a lot more physical play in the Red night to night, so we’ve struggled with that physicality a little bit,” Voss said. “Christian evens that up when he comes back in; he’s a pretty physical player. So, we’re making those adjustments, and I think that as our inside play improves, that’ll help our outside play.” Fincher also expects the Big Reds to turn things around as the year wears on. “Our team goal right now is to play hard for the rest of the season,” he said. “We’ve had a bit of a bad start, but we do have some things coming together. It all just has to come together. The chemistry is coming along very good right now. “I think our defense has really stepped up. We’ve been able to contest a lot more shots and been able to do a lot more things on our offense.” Catch the Big Reds in action next when they host rivals Macomb Dakota at 7 p.m. Feb. 5. |
