Taylor Brower is one of the new faces around Carbon High Athletics taking over the boy’s basketball program this upcoming season. The summer months are always slow at the school but it’s a great time for sports to build up their programs.
After the end of the school year, there wasn’t too much downtime for the Dinos because, on May 31 and June 1, they traveled to Manti for a camp, and then they were able to stay close to home and attend a camp put on by USU Eastern. Brower recently was a guest on KOAL’s Drive Time Sports and talked about the offseason and what he expects for the team this winter.
“We started in Manti on May 31 & June 1, went over there and played some really good teams, we learned a lot, I learned a lot about the kids while we were over there, it was only just a foundation to build on for the next couple of camps that we went to.”
Then they were able to stay local and attend the USU Eastern camp and play some great teams from around the state.
“That camp was a good camp, Brower stated. “We played Teton, we played Tooele, we played a bunch of teams. We played Emery, which was nice to see them before the actual season. But we played well, the kids played a lot of basketball, and then the week after that we went to UVU and played there for four days, we did the math and they played 42 games in seven days. We figured out what our identity needs to be, we determined us (the kids and the coaching staff), we’ve got to have the teams turn the ball over and we’ve got to transition, we’re really good at transitioning the ball. we’re still trying to figure out what good shots are and what bad shots are in transition, but it’s something that we can be very good at.”
Brower talked about the senior class that is coming in and how important it is for a first-year coach to get that senior class to buy in.
“The nice part, I mean with me being a teacher, is that I know some of the kids from my classes, so that’s been helpful. Getting them acclimated to my system has been hard, but I know that they’ve bought into it, most of them have bought into it. It’s been nice to have that leadership being able to pull them aside and say I need help with this or I need help with that, and they’ve been more than willing to help me with that. and we’ve got six seniors, we’ve got Dom Cowan, he’s a big guy, he plays offensive line for the football team, he’s super physical. Max Carlson, he’s high energy, he flies around, he rebounds the ball like crazy, and he’s like a Dennis Rodman he’ll go after the ball and he’ll keep after it until he gets it. Evan Lancaster, he’s a smart kid, level-headed, he dribbles the ball really well and he makes really good decisions. Rydge Butler is high energy, short fast, and kind of a nuisance when I had kids in the camps that I wanted to get “dogged”, I’d have Rydge go and dog them, just follow them all the way up, and he has a lot of energy. Charles Tima comes off the bench, he provides some good shooting abilities and plays defense quite well, and then Cannon Mortensen, if he sets his feet and shoots it, I don’t think he’s ever going to miss so he’s a good shooter, he plays a little bully ball, so when he drives to the hole he tries to move guys out of the way, which is helpful and everyone rebounds well.”
We will continue to follow the Carbon Dinos boys’ basketball team up to and through their season which will get going in November.