Flourishing Vikings boys basketball hopes carry momentum into second half

Charlo High School boys basketball coach Reese Cox is cementing his reputation as one of the premier strategists and he needs to be with his team playing in the most competitive district in Class C night in, night out.

When Cox inherited the team he had no easy task. Cox was taking over for the legendary valley coach Gale Decker but he also inherited one of the most athletically inclined and fastest teams in the district, a team more known for accomplishments on the gridiron than the hardwood.

Cox, knowing the athletic capabilities he has on his team, intends to change that as his team prepares for the second half of the season. He is already starting to get his Vikings squad to ‘buy in’ and realize their potential.

“I really enjoy the ability to prepare for games and not to brag or anything but in my opinion, and the rest of the Districts opinion, we have the best all-around athlete in Landers Smith,” Cox said. “We trust him to take on the challenge in shutting down key players. He understands his responsibilities well and plays lock-down defense. You can scheme him into the situations and the guy is going to get commit fouls or get key players fouled out.”

Cox attributed his early success to being able to look ahead at other opponents, taking every game a step at a time.

“I plan a little for who is in front of us but you really have to worry about who is on your front step,” Cox said. “I am looking not only who I have in front of me that week but also who is next because we have multiple games during the week. I want to be prepared. You have to game plan for multiple opponents for a Friday night game. When you have a Saturday night game, you still have to plan for both of those games.”

Cox is using his ability of foresight into looking at the early portion of the second half of the season. Charlo will play two big conference games when they return when they host Seeley on Jan. 5 and travel to play the Class C defending champion Arlee team at home on Jan. 11.

“I think that is the number one step to being moderately successful is that you know what you’ve got to do, know what the team is capable of and maybe pushing them a little bit more on what they think they can’t do,” Cox said. “I think you do something like this by believing you can do something and build them up for a challenge that they might not think they can handle. By the end of it, they find out they can achieve this.”

During the break, Cox said he will emphasize “fine-tuning” various details of his team’s game as they prepare for one of their biggest challenges of the season out of the gate of the second half against Arlee.

“We are going to be cleaning up a lot of our spots that we aren’t strong in yet and also adding new strategies,” said Cox. “I’ve got some ideas, thoughts, and game plans. Hopefully, we will do something against Arlee that they probably haven’t seen yet or faced against. That will lead us to some success. If our plan against Arlee fails, then I have some base defenses that we can put in and fall back on. We are just going to have to play our style of basketball.”

Cox admitted he was taken aback by Arlee doubling up on Plains at their home gym in their big 82-39 victory at Plains High School prior to the break.

“Seeing that outcome of the game, I haven’t gotten nervous facing Arlee or anything but I just thought to myself ‘wow, I wasn’t expecting something like that,” Cox said.