Howell returns to New London bench

NEW LONDON — There is nowhere to go other than up. New London was winless in the Firelands Conference last year, and won just two total games overall. But back on the bench for the Wildcats is a familiar face to try and get things back on track. Tom Howell, who coached New London for 14 seasons before spending the previous three years at Buckeye Central, is back as the head coach of the Wildcats. Howell won 185 games across his 14 seasons at New London before 24 wins at Buckeye Central. He is a New London graduate, ready to get back to what he built previously, which included two FC titles and a district championship. "We are working hard on all aspects of the game," Howell said. "We are very young. A lot of the younger players will get valuable minutes at the varsity level. "Players are trying to learn to play differently than they have the last few seasons. Our progress will depend on how fast they can pick this up." New London does return a nice quartet of letterwinners from last season in senior Gage Carroll, junior Aiden Ruggles, and sophomores Grady Heileman and Brody Sword. "Gage is our only senior with varsity experience. He is going to have to be our leader. We will rely on him for inside scoring and rebounding," Howell said. "Aiden is our only junior with varsity experience. He is going to have to help with handling the basketball and scoring." Heileman and Sword each saw varsity time as freshmen. "Grady is handling the basketball for us out front. He is also going to have to score for us," Howell said. "Brody can shoot the basketball. We are going to ask him to score in other ways than just shooting threes." Gone to graduation are leading scorer Conner Byrd (8.8 points per game) and Gavin Carruthers. New London won just 16 total games in the four seasons since Howell left after the 2018-2019 season. The Wildcats won 10 games in 2019-2020, but just six total since over the past three seasons. "We will be scrappy and get after it on the defensive end of the floor," Howell said. "Scoring off of our defense is important for us. Getting stops on the defensive end and getting out and running the floor is what we are focusing on." New London only averaged 37.1 points per game last season. Howell knows that will not win many games. "Scoring consistently is what we are trying to fix," Howell said. "We have to take care of the basketball and limit turnovers. Players are working hard to get better. Competing at practice and making each other better is the primary focus for New London basketball." The Wildcats will have to compete better on the defensive side of the ball, too. New London allowed an average of 62.5 points per game. "We will have a lot of sophomores playing at the varsity level this year," Howell said. "Grady, Garrett Carruthers, Brody, Jaxson Schaffer, and Presley Ferguson are battling for varsity minutes. "Some of these players got some varsity minutes as freshmen. Weston Risner and Gavin Clouse are juniors competing for time." It will likely be baby steps for New London in the tough FC. Some combination of Western Reserve, South Central, or Crestview have won the league each of the last six years since the Wildcats took home the title outright in 2016-2017. Before that, it had been five years since New London won the league championship. New London opens with non-league contests on the road against Wellington and Edison before hosting Mapleton and traveling to Plymouth to open FC play. "The Firelands Conference is a tough league," Howell said. "There are some good teams and coaches. Crestview has to be the favorite for the title. Our goal is to be better from week to week. If we can do this, we could surprise some teams this year."