Senior leadership and depth bring urgency to 2014-15 BYU basketball team


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PROVO — After meeting with the media Wednesday afternoon, it is clear that this year’s BYU basketball team is built on senior leadership and depth that could bring it some great success.

BYU enters the season with five seniors who have all contributed in past seasons for the Cougars. With these seniors comes strong leadership and work ethic along with their talent that has head coach Dave Rose eager for this year’s team.

“I’m really excited for this year’s leadership because these five seniors will come every day with a piece of urgency to them and a finality to their career that maybe we didn’t have in that locker room last year,” said Rose.

Urgency is definitely on the mind of these seniors and their younger teammates as each player is seeking to perform well not only for himself but for his teammates, in particular the seniors.

“We’re going to lean on them a lot this year for experience and leadership. When you have that many seniors they have a lot to play for and we want to play for them and it really makes a good dynamic, said junior guard Chase Fischer.

Many younger players on the team mentioned how much they recognize and appreciate the five seniors, including Tyler Haws, Nate Austin, Skyler Halford, Josh Sharp and Anson Winder and what they each individually bring to this year’s team, specifically during the offseason workouts.

“As a group with some of these senior leaders we’ve grown closer which is going to be a big deal all year,” said sophomore forward Luke Worthington. “Trusting each other, coming closer together, just playing as hard as we can and laying it all out there because that’s an element seniors bring.”

Along with a strong presence of senior depth, the team has an increase in overall depth going into this year in the form of an 18-player roster; five of whom are more than 6-foot-10-inches tall, making for a big frontcourt presence. This depth will be vital not only from a health perspective and game rotation but in the form of constant competition in team practices.

“Everyone’s got to get in and buy into this, and that urgency and that unity and that communication is going to be a big deal,” said Worthington.

A big cause for concern this offseason was the health of junior guard Kyle Collinsworth, who had ACL surgery at the end of the last season. According to Rose, Collinsworth has made great strides in his rehabilitation.

“We’re all extremely impressed with the timeline and how he’s met every goal date in his progression," said Rose. “We look forward to him being back at full speed sometime in the month of November.”

A healthy Collinsworth, five seniors and added depth will all be key as BYU doesn’t start the season off easy. It starts with a trip to Hawaii for the Maui Invitational and a slew of tough non-conference opponents, including in-state foes Utah and Utah State, in the month of December before conference play opens up with WCC defending champs Gonzaga Bulldogs at home.

“This is a really challenging preseason schedule, and I fully believe that our team will be prepared for this,” Rose said of the non-conference slate, “We have an opportunity to make some real noise there, especially on the national level.”

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Mitch Davis

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