CHOCOWINITY — Southside hosts Lejeune on Friday for its season opener. A long football campaign cut into the Seahawks’ time on the hardwood, and despite a lot of losses from last year, they’re ready to get back at it.

Here’s what coach Sean White had to say about a number of topics prior to Friday’s game against the Devil Pups.

 

What Southside lost from last year:

“Out of our top six or seven guys who played the most, we lost all of them to graduation. We’ve got four guys returning from last year’s team. Last year’s team was a small one. We only had about 12 guys, so most everyone got playing time pretty much every game.

 

How they’re dealing with another quick turnaround from football to basketball:

“Last year, we had the same thing, but it was about a week earlier. This year, it’s pretty much the same thing. I feel a little bit better. … Pretty much everybody was here the first day.”

 

How the Seahawks will use a small-ball approach:

“We don’t have height, but we never really have any height. What we do have is a lot of speed. … We’re going to rely on our speed a little bit more. The offense that we run kind of predicates that. Last year, we ran a four out with one inside, which was (Donshae) Tatum. This year we’ll go true five out to spread the court.”

 

What keeping the system relatively the same does to help continuity:

“The JV guys coming up — we’ve only got one or two guys that haven’t played and, for the most part, everyone else is coming back — they’ve been in the system. They know what we do pretty much. The first couple of days of practice after tryouts, we were just repeating stuff. We didn’t have to teach much.”

 

What the rest of the Coastal Plains looks like:

“I think the biggest competition, I think Jones Senior is going to surprise a lot of people. They’re pretty much getting everybody back. … I don’t think East Carteret is as good as they used to be. They ran into a buzzsaw in Northside-Jacksonville and lost by almost 30. … I know Pamlico County is a little down on numbers. East Carteret should still be good. Northside didn’t lose but a couple of guys. They’ve got that one freshman (Rashod Smith). I’ve seen him in middle school. He’s a baller.”