Patriots Winter Teams Motivated to Surprise

Freedom boys basketball coach Joseph Stellato knows he has a young team. He accepts the fact the Patriots graduated 9 seniors from a team that won 15 games and advanced into the third round of districts a season ago.  He knows he has just two players on his current roster with varsity experience. He says he understands that for his team to have success in the coming season he will have to get a lot out of some young players.

What he cannot accept, however, is that any of his players would show up to practice and not box out.

"We are going to rebound the basketball!" Stellato yells at his players during a recent practice.

Freedom, now 1-4 on the season, will have a stiff learning curve as it competes in the Lehigh Valley Interscholastic Athletic Conference. Stellato is determined to have his team playing to win.

 "I don't want to say this is a rebuilding year," Stellato said. "I don't want to say let's look at next year. I'm trying to have them buy into the idea that we can compete this year. I'm trying to let those young kids know what our league is like, because they have no idea."

The coach says he will need big years out of sophomores forward Nyreef Jackson and center Derike Chicalana to go along with what experience the team does have in order for the Patriots to have sustained success.

"I have two sophomores that are very very good players, they're just not physical enough," Stellato said. "That's normal at their age, but we're trying to compete now ... They need to get more physical, and that's the bottom line."

Senior center/forward Lukas Giovarelli and junior guard Joseph Lococo are the two returning players the Patriots will need to lean on to have a successful season.

Add to the mix sharp shooting junior Jessiel Colon and slashing senior guard Christian Castro, and Freedom could have the makings of a good team this year.

"If we can slip into districts then that's a great season," Stellato said. "We are athletic enough to cause some fits for some people."

Coach: Girls team young, undersized, but not over-matched

The uphill climb for the boys' varsity basketball team may be small compared to their sisters on the girls team.

Coach Gerald Calabrese has just two seniors on this season's team after graduating ten from last year. And of those two, only Amanda Murphy had significant playing time. Then there is the matter of team size: only one player on the Patriots' roster is above 5'9". But Calabrese refuses to make excuses.

"Our size isn't what beat us on Saturday," he said of a recent game against Nazareth. "Our turnovers beat us, our poor defensive effort beat us and probably poor game planning on my part."

Calabrese says he expects his young team to learn as the season goes on. And he wants to play as many of his girls as possible, to help accelerate the process.

"I think that learning process will come quickly," Calabrese said. "That just comes from minutes on the floor. The other night I think we played 14 or 15 (players) -- everybody on the roster.  

"I think the objective here is to get everyone of those kids substantial playing time. That's how they they're going to get better."

Murphy says she wants to help her teammates learn this season. "We're a young team, but as a senior I definitely feel the responsibility to pick everybody up," she said.

For the Patriots to have success, Calabrese said the team must have every player execute. He wants to prevent Patriot opponents from keying on just one or two players.

"Hopefully we are going to make them play all five of us," he said. "I think it is going to be pretty well balanced.

"We might have somebody come out for a big night but it's not going to be a consistent person, I don't believe. I hope someone surprises me and gets 20 a night. But I don't think it's going to happen."

Swim team dives into new season with high expectations

Boys and girls swimming coach Barbara Glaser expects her teams to build off of the success they had a season ago and continue to push themselves to set new school records.

"I expect for every time to drop, everybody in the pool to do better overall on the season," Glaser said. " I expect some team records to be broken this year."

Glaser is in her second season leading the girls recently took over as coach for the boys team as well.

Leading the way for a boys team that finished 6-4 on the season is junior captain Stephen Yale. Yale who competes in the 200-meter freestyle and the 500-meter freestyle, says he wants the Patriots to continue the success they had last season.

"I think we came out as a team last year and surprised some other schools," Yale said. "That's what we're going for again. To show everyone that we belong there.

"Last year we sent a relay to states," he continued. "You just want to keep sending teams to states, keeping sending people to districts. Overall, just keep progressing."

Glaser said because the girls team does not have a lot of swimmers, the goal is more focused on individual success.

"100 percent of the girls dropped times over the course of the season," Glaser said. "And 100 percent of the girls competed at district meets and dropped times further at that meet. Not so much win meets. We don't have a lot of depth."

Second year captain Aubree Guidon, who swims the 100-meter freestyle, 50-meter freestyle and the 100-meter fly, said having a fewer swimmers this season should not stop the girls from competing.

"That's definitely not going to stop us because we have a lot of new swimmers that can do well," the senior said. "Hopefully we'll progress even further than last year."