DP boys hoops off to strong start in '15

ORLANDO — There was a point, just before the new year, when things weren’t looking good for the Dr. Phillips boys basketball team.

The Panthers had just lost a tough overtime contest to Oldsmar Christian, 74-67, dropping them to 6-7 on the season. Dr. Phillips, a favorite to make it to Lakeland for the Class 8A Final Four before the season began, had dropped out of the Class 8A rankings and found its remarkable streak of 21 consecutive 20-win seasons in serious jeopardy.

Since the clock struck midnight on New Year’s Eve and 2015 arrived, however, the Panthers have made quite an about-face, winners of seven straight after blowing out Timber Creek on Friday, 79-40.

Coach Anthony Long said there’s no secret formula to the team’s hot start in 2015.

“We’ve been playing really good teams, and we’ve been working really hard in practice,” Long said. “Now, our early, rugged schedule is starting to pay off.”

Last week was a big week for Dr. Phillips (13-7), with the Panthers defeating Evans, ranked No. 1 in Class 8A, on Jan. 13, 61-51. Dr. Phillips followed that big win by beating up on host Boone on Jan. 15 in an important district matchup, 71-49.

Looking back, senior point guard David Stephen — who scored a game-high 26 points for the Panthers against the Braves — said the two difficult losses the team had during the holiday break to elite competition (Oldsmar and DeMatha Catholic [Maryland] as part of the Victor Oladipo Hoops Festival), might have made them better in the long run.

"Our energy has gone way higher (since those games),” Stephen said. “We learned from (Oldsmar and DeMatha) because they have high-DI guys and stuff like that. Coming out of those games, we kind of picked up a few things from them.”

In addition to wins over the Trojans, Braves and Wolves, Dr. Phillips has defeated Haines City, West Orange, Freedom and The First Academy so far in January. One of the keys, agreed upon by Long and his players, has been an improved commitment to excelling on the defensive end of the floor.

“Defense has been the biggest part, actually,” senior forward Jonathan Laurent said. “At first, our half-court defense was terrible. Then our half-court defense got better, and then our full-court defense, our transition defense, was terrible, so we fixed that up. After we fixed those two things, everything started picking up.”

Of course, for Long, it helped to have solid leadership from his senior duo — especially back in 2014, when the Panthers were losing games.

“(The senior leadership has) been great,” Long said. “Jonathan Laurent and David Stephen … when you’re losing early, it could be easy for things to fall apart. But when you have strong character in the locker room, and you have strong leaders, they didn’t let that happen.”

The Panthers will host Cypress Creek at 7:30 p.m. Jan. 22.

Contact Steven Ryzewski at [email protected].