Basketball teams hit the floor running

With the fall sports season in the books, attention at Maricopa High now turns to the winter campaign.

Both basketball programs recently welcomed athletes for the 2007-08 season.

On the boys’ side, head coach Andy Branchik had about 25 boys come out for the varsity team.

“We had a total of about 65 boys come out for all three teams,” Branchik said. “To my recollection I believe those are the highest numbers that the Maricopa boys’ basketball team has ever had.” Branchik added that he wanted to thank all the past players who had set the standard so high to make basketball such an appealing program.

“My goals are to build a winning team, mentally and physically, in the first couple of weeks,” Branchik remarked. “A unit that works as one no matter what the situation is.”

Branchik said the players came into practice in good shape because they had conditioning for two months prior to the season.

Maricopa’s first scrimmage is this Thursday.

On the girls’ side, head coach Jennifer Miller and the Lady Rams had much better numbers to start their season this year. Miller noted that 37 girls came out for the team this season.

“The goals for the first two weeks of practices have really been solid fundamentals and conditioning,” Miller said. “We have worked really hard on the basics of basketball because so many of the girls who came out this year are lacking experience playing organized basketball.”

According to Miller, some of the girls came into practice in decent shape, but there’s a big difference between “good shape” and “playing condition.”

“We have had to do substantial work just to get many of the girls into shape,” Miller noted. “We’re still working on getting them into playing condition.”

Maricopa’s first scrimmage is on Friday.