Tyler Legacy Red Raiders begin practice looking to bounce back from 2021-22 season

Published 11:44 am Wednesday, October 26, 2022

Wednesday marked the first official day that UIL boys basketball teams could begin practicing.

The Tyler Legacy Red Raiders — coming off a one-win campaign in 2021-22 — took to the hardwood early Wednesday morning in preparation of the new season.

“It’s fun,” Legacy head boys basketball coach Kevin Walker said. “Obviously we didn’t have as great a year as we hoped to last year. It gave everybody, our whole program, a lot of motivation, because we’ve got a much bigger goal in mind than just that.”

The Red Raiders entered last season with no varsity experience after graduating every senior from the previous team that won a district title and advanced to the postseason.

Now, Legacy has some varsity experience, but there is still plenty of youth.

“We were young from an experience standpoint last year. This year, we’re just young,” Walker said. “We’ve got quite a few sophomores and a freshman with us, so it’s a good mix of having those guys, the returners that went through what they did last year and have seen it. Nobody had ever seen it last year. But they saw it. And we’ve got this younger group that these guys can kind of help walk through situations. We’re excited to have these guys out here competing and about what we’re going to do this year.”

The Red Raiders have three seniors — Nick Vasso, Xavier Smith and Cayden Callier.

“I’m excited and ready for the season,” Vasso said. “We’ve put a lot of work in, so I’m ready to get back out there and start playing games. We got the experience from last year. We know what not to do. We all know the work we need to make sure that never happens again, and it starts with me. We’ll do everything we can and work hard every day to make sure we keep having great practices.”

Jayden Jones, who logged a lot of minutes for the Red Raiders last season as a freshman, is looking to take that next step as a sophomore.

“I am really excited to get back out here,” Jones said. “Last year wasn’t a good season, but I’m ready to get back out here and play. We learned to share the ball more and not to have an individual mindset but to really have a team mindset.”

The Red Raiders are hoping everything comes together and this team is playing postseason basketball in 2023.

“From a game standpoint, you don’t go through much more adversity than what those guys went through last year,” Walker said. “And to their credit, they kept coming back. They would get punched, and they kept coming back. They’ve had a great spring, a great summer, and we’ve really gotten after them in the fall. And we’re just excited to come out here and compete. We’re proud of what they’ve done, but we’ve obviously not satisfied. We’re continuing to teach them and reminding these guys that we’re not fighting for Oct. 26. We’re fighting for January and February for those 12 district games and trying to get to that third season.”

Legacy will open the season Nov. 11 at Hallsville. The Red Raiders’ first home game will be Nov. 29 against crosstown rival Tyler.