PEMBROKE — A hungry veteran corps coupled with several transfers with college experience is the group that The University of North Carolina at Pembroke men’s basketball team brings into the 2019-2020 season.
After back-to-back Peach Belt Conference regular season and tournament championships in 2017 and 2018, the Braves fell short of completing the three-peat last year. That shortcoming has turned over into the offseason.
“It was a big thing for us and we are just trying to carry it in the beginning of this year. We want to focus everyday in practice,” junior guard David Strother said.
The Braves return six of their top nine players that saw the floor for more than 12 minutes a game last season, and bring in three transfers, two with Division-I experience, to round out the rotation for coach Ben Miller entering his 12th season with the program.
“Hopefully everybody comes back a little hungrier and I think I’ve seen that in the offseason with the guys,” Miller said. “And we’ve still got a target on our backs and people are going to be giving us their best shot because we will probably come into the season picked inside the top two or three in the conference.”
In 2018, the Braves matched a program-best 27 wins en route to earning the conference regular season and tournament title, as well as advancing to the second round of the NCAA tournament for the second time in program history. Last season, UNCP made the NCAA tournament for the third year in a row with a 21-10 overall record, also a program first, before falling short in the first round in a 19-point loss against Catawba.
The Braves have been picked to finish second in the preseason Peach Belt Conference coaches poll.
After the two-year dominance of the program was based on stellar defense, the Braves regressed on the defensive side of the ball in 2019. The team’s defensive field goal percentage went from 40 percent in 2018 to 42 percent a game last year. Opponents also scored three more points per game last season as opposed to the year before as well.
“With a veteran team, we really have two new guys that we are working into the rotation,” Miller said. “The expectations for themselves and the staff is very high defensively.”
Senior forward Akia Pruitt earned the Peach Belt defensive player of the year award the last two years and has taken ownership to make the team better this season.
“We just push each other everyday and stay on each other. If we see somebody doing something wrong or doing something they can improve on, we pull each other to the side and say something,” Pruitt said. “I’m just trying to step up. I kind of digressed over the last few years so I want to be where I was during my freshman year.”
Pruitt is the main post presence and averaged more than 14 points and seven rebounds a game last season. He was voted to the preseason all-conference team and is 158 rebounds this season to become the league’s all-time leading rebounder.
Miller said he has seen a increased level of urgency from the 6-foot-7 forward.
“We always plays. He plays all the time. However, I don’t know if up until this summer that he has had a great lifting summer. He was here all summer lifting with David and some of the other guys. I think he made more strides with his strength,” Miller said. “And also he really helped his perimeter scoring because he’s a guy that can play the 4 or the 3 for us. He’s really expanded his game.”
Joining Pruitt in the ever-important frontcourt for Miller’s style of play are returners redshirt senior Carson Mounce and junior Spencer Levi. Levi transferred into the program before last season and scored nearly nine points and pulled six boards in 17 minutes on average each game last season as a main contributor off the bench.
Former NC State player Shaun Kirk plays his final season of eligibility with the Braves this season and his athleticism and size is a welcome sign entering the year.
“He’s a high-energy guy and he plays hard,” Pruitt said of Kirk. “He knows what he’s doing coming from NC State so I think it is a good fit.”
“He brings defense and he’s long. He’s going to be exciting to watch,” Strother said of Kirk.
Kirk joins VMI transfer guard Jordan Ratliffe and Newberry transfer Jabrie Bullard, as newcomers that will see the floor immediately for the team.
“I love their chemistry,” Miller said of the team as a whole. “They can go at each other like dogs but then they can leave it on the court and laugh, then go hang out and get a pizza together and play 2K or whatever they do. They compete and early on in our pickup games they were super competitive.”
Ratliffe and Bullard will add depth to a backcourt that saw the departure of two guards, Cam Hamilton and Jamal Bryant, as transfers last year. Returners in the backcourt are Tyrell Kirk and Strother, while the status of senior Micah Kinsey is unclear entering the year. The Kirk-Strother backcourt has been together in Pembroke for the last two seasons, and has gone back even further to their AAU days. Strother averaged 11.5 points per game last season, second-best among returners, and is the team’s leader in steals. Both players were weapons from deep, shooting better than 35 percent from deep a season ago.
The road is calling the Braves to open the season, with the first six games away from home before opening the home slate against Mount Olive on Dec. 1. UNCP opens the season with the same team that ended last season, Catawba, on Friday in the PBC/SAC Challenge hosted at Francis Marion at 1 p.m.
