Newcomers preparing for a demanding season

Craig Haley, NJHoops.com Columnist
October 2, 2007

The newcomers on the Blair Academy (Blairstown) basketball team might believe they will have it tough this season with head coach Joe Mantegna's demanding style.

Wait until they run into his wife. Shelly Mantegna is a certified yoga instructor who will work with the Blair players during the preseason.

"They usually don't know what to expect," Joe Mantegna said. "They think (yoga) is going to be easy and then my wife kicks them in the butt for a couple weeks."

Fitness, injury prevention and mental toughness will be key factors in the preseason because Blair lost nine seniors from a 19-7 squad which lost to the Hun School in both the Prep 'A' state final and the Mid-Atlantic Prep League final.

At least three of the newcomers figure to be starters, so the Buccaneers will have some chemistry lessons before they mix as a team.

The newcomers who should be starters are Stanford-bound Jarrett Mann the 6-foot-4 shooting guard who is ranked eighth in the Class of 2008 by NJ Hoops; 6-8 junior forward Austin Johnson, who is ranked fifth in the Class of 2009 by NJ Hoops; and 6-9 post-graduate Alex Vouyoukas, who committed to Davidson last week. Vouyoukas is a European-type big man who should keep up with the way Blair will run the floor.

The other post-grads stepping into the program are a pair of 6-2 shooting guards, Nick Lehn, from Connecticut, and Cam Chambers, from North Carolina.

Sophomore Hakim Harris is the team's only returning starter, and the 6-foot guard should switch to the point after playing off the ball opposite Justin Robinson, now a freshman at Rider. Ameer Brown, 27th among juniors in the state, probably will be the fifth starter. The 6-4 forward has been receiving interest from Ivy League, Patriot League and Colonial Athletic Association schools.

The sophomore class is particularly deep, with 6-5, 215-pound forward Tyler McNeely and 6-2 shooting guard Ryan Lubreski expected to garner minutes.

"I'm hoping by Christmas that we'll start to have an identity," Mantegna said. "We hope to have the roles figured out by then and that we'll start to play like a Blair basketball team."

Blair will play in the Boys' Club of New York Holiday Classic as well as some games in Manchester, England, and regular-season games against St. Benedict's (Newark), St. Patrick's (Elizabeth) and Hun School (Princeton Township). The Bucs again should be Hun's chief challenger in the prep ranks.

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