With only two returning players, Vista starting over

With only two returning varsity players at his disposal, Vista del Lago varsity boys' basketball coach Josh Gould was basically starting all over with his summer program. Only seniors Max Prouhet, a returning second-team all-league player, and Meyer Lathe played on the varsity team last winter, so the team spent the month of June familiarizing themselves with each other. The team played around 20 games and won probably half, according to Gould. "There was a lot of new defensive tactics that we emphasized early on, thanks to assistant coach Will FitzPatrick," said Gould. "Looking at a lot of the games we played, we sometimes looked lethargic and played down to teams and that frustrated me, but our defense, compared to the end of the season, looked a lot more disciplined. The question for us is going to be what level of sustained effort are we comfortable playing at and what's acceptable long term." This summer was essentially like starting from scratch, as Gould coached a team last winter with 10 seniors. "We spent a lot of time figuring out how to play together," Gould said. "We were doing simple things on both sides of the ball. Offensively, we didn't really put in set plays or a system, we just got the ball moving side to side and try to get the best possible shots. The only plays we ran were inbound and sideline out of bounds plays." Gould was pleased with his two returning players. "We had about 12 or 13 players on varsity with Max and Meyer as the returnees," Gould said. "Max was Max, but Meyer has made really big strides from last year. He didn't play that much as a junior on a senior-heavy team, but I saw a lot of growth from him. He gave 100 percent every single second he was on the court. He exhausted himself always playing the right way with a ton of energy. If I had 13 guys playing like that, we'd win a section title if not a state title. He was crazy energetic. He got a lot of reps and I could see his confidence grow. Max played great too, but Meyer filled a much bigger gap." One thing that the team doesn't have is height, which will make things more difficult. "We're going to have to do all the little things because our tallest guy is 6-2," Gould said. "My biggest complaint over the summer is I wished we would have played a little harder. If we want to have a winning record next season, we're going to have to play two to three times harder than we did in the summer."