EudoraNews.com

The Eudora Cardinals boys basketball season tips off Monday with a trip to the Paola Invitational Tournament. For coach Scott Stein, the new season begins with some old problems.

The Cardinals come off of an 11-11 campaign that saw them play some of their best ball as the season waned. Eudora put together a three-game winning streak before ending the season with a loss to Kansas City-Sumner in the 4A sub-state tournament.

Unfortunately for the Cardinals, the strong finish was fueled by the play of the team's seniors. And now graduation has taken some of the bite from Eudora's offense and stinginess from their defense as they begin the 2004-2005 season.

Gone are seniors Tyler Cleveland, Chris Gabriel, Josh Lauer and Josh Brouhard. Gabriel takes with him 12.6 points per game and an intimidating inside presence that produced 135 rebounds. Cleveland posted a team-high 88 assists and 26 steals.

Starting Monday, Stein will begin the task of finding the production that was lost to graduation.

The Cardinals have only one returning starter from last year's squad, 5-foot, 11-inch senior Jeremie Bryant, who averaged 5.5 points per game and grabbed 62 rebounds in 22 games. Junior Mark Abel adds his 34-percent perimeter shooting. Abel logged significant varsity time, playing in 21 games.

Eudora had some good athletes who had succeeded in other varsity sports at the varsity level, and Stein said he hoped that would translate to the team's loss of senior leadership. Eudora's size comes from 6-foot, 3-inch senior Joe Kaup, who averaged 1.2 points in 10 games last year, and 6-foot, 3-inch junior Guy Montgomery. Both have little varsity experience but will be needed to fill the inside presence vacated by Chris Gabriel.

The speed and quickness needed for the team to compete will come from senior Brendan Jackson and a trio of juniors -- Rodney Spillman, Luke Abel and Nolan Smith. Luke Abel contributed from the perimeter last season, shooting 7-for-20 from the three-point line.

"We will try to play up-tempo this year to make up for a lack of size," Stein said. "We intend to push the ball more offensively and pressure more on defense to try and take advantage of our speed."

All of the physical aspects aside, the Cardinals will have to do one other thing to win ball games -- shoot the ball.

The Cardinals will look to sustain and improve on a year that saw them shoot 45 percent from the field and 30 percent from beyond the arc.

With the loss of senior production, the road for the Cardinals could be rough. Eudora competes in a league where Gardner, Ottawa, and Spring Hill are expected to vie for the title of Frontier League champs. The Cardinals have been picked to finish 10th in a league of 13 teams by the league coaches.

"The league preview is an incentive to do better than we were picked," Stein said. "Realistically, we lost most of our team from a year ago."