Knyte Time!
By: Brandon Haughton
Head Coach James Broadous II is approaching his sixth season as head coach of the Knights. Last season, De La Salle finally captured the 3A State Title after beating a tough Dayton team. Team finished with the season 27-1 while capturing a League/ District Title along the way. The last time De La Salle loss was on 12/8/2018 against Horizon Christian. “Right now my players are still riding high off the state title. I want them to enjoy it and keep the energy of it, they deserve to. It is not easy to win a State Championship in any sport that's for sure. However, they are starting to realize that it's even harder to repeat. I do not allow them to wear their Championship Rings anymore as a way of letting them know this is a NEW season! They're all in on that.”
This upcoming season, Lewis and Clark League will look a lot different then it did in the past. LCL League will include De La Salle, Catlin Gabel, PAA, Riverdale, OES, Westside Christian and Horizon Christian. “ I have mixed feelings about the new league. I will miss the great competitions we had with the schools as well as the relationships I built with those coaches. However I will not miss the long travel on school nights. I think the additions to our league does keep the integrity of competitive balance the LCL is known to have.”
De La Salle graduated some key players off last season State Title team including 3A State Player of The Year Emmanuel Reiley and All State Kadren Addy. How will they bounce back? “If you've watched our program over the years, you realize we play a lot of guys and sorta pride ourselves in knowing that on any given day someone different can lead our team in scoring. We had 8 different guys lead us in scoring last season. This season All signs point to Kadeem Nelson and George Sadi doing the heavy lifting in the scoring category as they are both gifted scorers. However Theo Aclan and Anthony Mosley will no doubt lead our defensive efforts, which to us is equally as important as scoring.”
I asked coach to define his team with one word and here was his response. “Family, we cannot sustain our style of play without guys covering for each other, being selfless and holding each other accountable everyday. Just like a family does. We consistently have 2 team goals and they have not wavered over the past 6 years, win the League/ District title and play in the last game of the 3A basketball season.
