Chillicothe HS girls, Zane Trace boys basketball eye successful seasons
CHILLICOTHE, Ohio — With all the fall postseasons in the book and weather starting to turn colder, the winter seasons are starting to take center stage in our local gymnasiums. Each season brings new rosters and new expectations for several teams around the area. The optimism of everyone going through the preseason will soon be tested as some teams will get off to great starts, while other teams fall on hard times and adversity.
Two teams that appear to be capturing plenty of attention during the holiday season are the Chillicothe Lady Cavaliers and the Zane Trace Pioneers. For Chillicothe head coach Anthony Gordon’s squad, this team has been building over the last calendar year, gaining experience and working through the adversity of injuries. For Gary Kellough’s Zane Trace squad, it is a preseason of wearing the title of defending champion and looking to take on a long list of hopeful title contenders.
The Chillicothe girls return an extremely talented cast led by Jacey Harding, and with kids like Avery Erslan and Paige Huggins, there should be plenty of balance in the scoring column to make Chillicothe extremely difficult to guard. All of this added up to a second place finish last year in the Frontier Athletic Conference. Now, the program’s core group returns a little bit better and a little bit healthier, and the expectations seem pretty obvious in 2023.
“One of my team’s main goals this year is to win the FAC title,” said Harding, who just surpassed the impressive career scoring milestone of 1,000 points early in her senior season. “We worked really hard during the offseason since coming in second place last year. My personal goals are to be the best teammate and leader that I can be, on and off the court, and playing to the best of my ability.”
After talking to Harding, it became obvious that the individual goals were only about helping accomplish the one team goal that just slipped away a year ago. It was almost like hearing an echo of these goals throughout the entire roster.
“My focus for this season is to be the best teammate I can be while also playing to the best of my ability,” said Erslan. “A team goal we have this year is winning a league title.”
As for the ZT boys, they too have aspirations of winning a league title, but for them, it would mean going back-to-back, because they return a core group who is wearing the bullseye of defending champion. This group has incredible size and athleticism, led by Xzander Ream, who made the All-SVC First Team last year as a junior. The extremely versatile Ream has plenty of next-level talent, but when talking to him about his individual vision, the conversation quickly turned to what his team hoped to accomplish.
“I want to be the best player I can be going into my college career,” said Ream when asked about his personal approach throughout the offseason and into his senior year. “More importantly, I want to accomplish more than what we were able to accomplish last year. Goals for this season are obviously to win the SVC and enter the tournament with an amazing seed. With this being my senior year and the last time I’ll get to put on a Pioneer jersey, I want to leave a mark. I want people to remember my name and my teammates for what we accomplished.”
Even following such a successful season, the way it ended was something that pushed Ream to want to work for much more in his final high school season.
“Ever since that final buzzer rang at Waverly and my junior season ended, I’ve had a voice in my head just telling me repeatedly that wasn’t good enough,” said Ream, who led the Pioneers in scoring last year at over 14 points per game. “That voice set a fire burning in me ever since that. I understand now that hustle and heart sets us apart from everyone else, and I believe we’re capable of doing bigger and better things this year.”
With a senior-laden group, the understanding of preparation is well understood. Senior Nalin Robinson has been part of a lot of winning at Zane Trace throughout his career in multiple sports. He spoke to me about the importance of having overall goals but understanding the importance of working one step at a time.
“I think that our goal is to improve and come together as a team every practice and game,” said Robinson, who helped lead ZT football to an undefeated regular season and a Gold Football in the SVC. “As for the big picture, our goal is always to win the conference and to make a deep run into the tournament.”
Robinson returns as one of the most efficient scorers in the league. Last year, he shot over 55% from the floor while recording the league’s best free throw percentage at 77%. He is joined by post presence Kyle Stonerock, who, like Robinson, needs very few shots to score big, considering he made 62% of his shots from the floor last year.
Zane Trace will be calling on some guard play to take positive steps forward and take on new roles and experiences, but it is hard to argue the challenge other SVC coaches will face when trying to match up with this year’s Zane Trace squad.
As we flip the calendar to 2023, the Lady Cavs and the Pioneers of Zane Trace will be chasing the goals these athletes have mentioned, but there will be plenty of chasers in both the FAC and the SVC trying to make these goals tough to accomplish. This should set a foundation for some hoop headlines, and I look forward to following and reporting about all the great basketball stories in Ross County.
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