SU sets sights on SWAC title

 
The Southern men’s basketball team is 30 days away from their season opener against Iowa State and head coach Roman Banks and his squad have high expectations to follow up their success from last season.
Prior to the entrance of Banks, the Jaguar basketball team went through a streak of losing seasons, only accumulating one winning season from the past 10 years.
Banks and his staff changed the atmosphere of the Southern basketball program, finishing with a 17-14 winning record and finishing second in the Southwestern Athletic Conference to the surprise of opponents.
But this year the Jaguars will surprise no one …
Returning only two starters, from last year’s squad the Jaguars are restocking on talent to reach the prize of SWAC champions.
“My expectation for this team is to go out there and compete and represent this university to the best of our abilities and to hopefully like many coaches, come out on the winning end most nights,” Banks said.
Some of the new comers who will look to contribute are players like forward Brandon Moore, a grad student who played for Arkansas and Florida International, came to SU to exhaust his final year of eligibility with the Jaguars.
“He’s been around for five years and he hasn’t put up the stats you would like to see on paper but his involvement that you would like to see from his five years being around would hopefully kick in and mature us and bring us some instant help.” Banks said.
The 6-foot-9 New Orleans native will be a big addition to the team that is lacking size after the departures of the 6-foot-8 Quinton Doggett and the 6-foot-6 Frederick Coleman.
Along with Moore, Javan Mitchell didn’t play all of last season and will be on the team to be another contributor down in the paint.
“He’s definitely going to have to be a major contributor.” Banks said.
The 6-foot-9, 255-pound center is a transfer from Louisiana-Lafayette made six starts for the Ragin’ Cajuns.
ESPN.com ranked Mitchell as the 50^th best center in the country and played two seasons at St. Martinville High School and played his final two seasons in Greensboro, N.C., at Day School.
The Jaguars also recruited and signed three other freshman during the off-season; Devonse Reed, Chris Hyder and Damian Goodwin.
Reed, a 6-foot-4 guard from Wilmer Hutchins High School was named Texas Class 3A player of the year averaging 24.4 points and 7.2 rebounds per game.
Hyder, a 5-foot-10 point guard from Cliff High School in Texas lead his team to 4A state semifinals as a senior, and Banks compared him to Avery Johnson in the way he made passes controlling the game.
Goodwin is a 6-foot-7 forward that’s a product of Columbia High School of Decatur, Ga., helped his team make it to its third consecutive Georgia Class 3A title.
With the season coming near, the Jags will face seven FBS schools including: Iowa State, Nebraska, Wyoming, Tulane, Louisiana-Monroe, TCU, and Texas A&M.
“These teams, they invite you in for a reason and on paper the conference they play in is very good,” Banks said. “They are expected to beat a school of our stature 10 out of 10 times, but we hope to put together a team this year and in the near future that can compete with those guys.”