High School Boys Basketball: Mark Morris off to uneven start in new season
Royal Standards – Monarchs leaning on Ibarreta early to cover for lack of experience
Jordan Nailon for Blast Zone Media / blastzonenews@gmail.com
Prep Boys Basketball / Scouting Report
For fans of Mark Morris boys basketball there has been an unsettling amount of change that is too obvious to ignore on Natt Court this season.
There’s only one player on the team who played extended varsity minutes last season. He’s a senior named Drew Ibarreta, and he’s gonna be asked to do a lot to fill the shoes of Mark Morris legends who graduated in the offseason..
There’s only one coach on the team who graduated before 2016. His name is Ken Kelly, and in year-two at the helm he’s still being asked to do a lot to fill the shoes of his predecessor, Bill Bakamus. You know, the guy they named the Monarchs home gymnasium after.
Here is where I’d like to point out in motivational style that graduated guys like Dalton Stevens and Carson Bogner aren’t going to be walking through that door this season. However, Stevens is next door playing at LCC and has already been a special guest this season for State banner unveiling to celebrate last season’s accomplishments. And Bogner? Well, he’s now an assistant coach for the Monarchs.
But all of that inexperience, or at least experience thrust into new positions and responsibilities, hasn’t done anything to lower the expectations for the Monarchs. At least not inside the team room. And especially not for Ibareta.
“After losing what we did, having somebody like that around is just a huge blessing,” Kelly said. “While a lot of people on the outside believe this is just a rebuilding year for us, he doesn’t, and I don’t.”
But it’s not going to be easy. While the Monarchs were busy attending graduation parties for last year’s core, the rest of the 2A GSHL was busy reloading, getting older, and better. And an up and down start in the first fortnight of the season has done little to quiet those whispers of doubt in the stands.
The Monarchs currently sit at 2-3 on the season, with a blowout loss to Kelso last Friday compounded by an altogether uncommon loss at Aberdeen on Monday. Mark Morris took a modest step in the right direction with a come-from-behind win at Hudson’s Bay to open 2A GSHL play on Wednesday, but there’s still a long row to hoe in the land of opportunity.
And if the Monarchs are going to be putting hay in the barn later this winter, it’s going on the back of their senior point guard – Ibarreta.
Last year was his breakout season, when he committed just 24 turnovers in 30 games while facilitating the offense and picking his spots to blow up the scorebook. Sources say Ibarreta spent another offseason in full gym rat mode, and now, he’s calm, cool, and more confident than ever as he steps up to seize the alpha role for the Monarchs.
“In the end he’s going to go down as one of the greatest guards that we’ve ever had,” Kelly asserted.
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