Toney Cooper’s Dragons will be looking to strengthen their depth as the 2024-25 basketball season unfolds on the road at Marlow December 3.

Coming off a 20-7 record last year, Cooper welcomes back a foursome of starters off last year’s team.

Returning starters include seniors Kenna Esparza, Tinley Winters, Hadleigh Harp and Haven Buchanan.

Top prospects to help the Dragons this year include Lili Del Toro, Halle Buchanan and Kaylee Peoples.

“All three of them have shown improvement and played solid in our scrimmages,” Cooper said.

Del Toro is a junior, Buchanan is a sophomore and Peoples is a freshman.

Experience will be a factor for the Dragons especially early in the campaign.

“It’s definitely the team strength,” Cooper said. “We have four returning senior starters and key players who had significant minutes last season in a reserve role. We should be ready for anything.”

Cooper reports his club needs to execute better in their half court offense.

“We need to be more consistent defensively across all four quarters,” he confirmed.

The overall outlook remains the same, the coach said.

“Our goal is to make it to the state tournament,” Cooper said. “We are developing our bench and will lean on our seniors to lead the way.

“I’m excited for this season. We are ready to compete,” he concluded.

New Dragons head coach Matt Lohn returns three starters off last year’s 12-14 team including seniors Brayden Tharp and Seth Bunch and junior Jaime Resendiz.

“Jaime had a great finish to last season,” Lohn said.” He began to find his groove offensively. He will play a large role in both scoring and rebounding and will have to play larger than his stature throughout the season.”

Tharp returns as the go-to defender.

“He’s our defensive specialist, always willing to guard the other team’s best offensive player,” Lohn said. “This year he will also have to step into more of an offensive role, using his athleticism as a slasher to get to the rack and free throw line. I will look for him to contribute consistently on both ends of the floor.”

The vocal leader of the squad is Bunch.

“We will also look to him to produce offensively,” Lohn said. “His shot has been effective thus far. He poses problems for our opponents due to his skill set and size. I will also be looking for him  to contribute with his size and athleticism on the defensive glass.”

Kyler Rangel will be stepping into a bigger role as one of our floor generals,” the head coach said. “He has great poise, is strong with the ball and has done a tremendous job of finding his teammates in good positions.”

Canaan Colburn transferred in from Noble and will also be taking point guard duties.

“He brings a spark of energy with his aggression on both ends of the floor. He helps instill a toughness within our team,” Lohn said. “He is a junk yard dog and one heck of a defender.”

Lohn believes the strength of this year’s squad is depth.

“We have had a tremendous amount of competition from 1-10 since day one. I expect that to continue to gel. I feel great about our ability to play through the adversity that foul trouble and injuries bring knock on wood.”

Purcell will be forced to fill a huge offensive void with leading scorer Kobe Freeman transferring to Owasso and Kylen DeFreeze graduating.

“I expect we will have some growing pains early on, but we will have to continue to navigate and improve our offensive efficiency,” Lohn said. “Early on we will have to lean on our defense to help get us through some lean times offensively.

“Overall, I am excited to see what my guys will do this season,” he said. “They have been hungry since day one. We have continued to build our consistency as a team.

“These kids have a high expectation for what we will accomplish this year. My plan is to continue to push them forward toward those goals. For me not having seen the Canadian Valley Conference in over a decade, I am not sure exactly what to expect other than a worthy opponent most every night.

“I believe our team has the depth and ability to play with anyone who steps across from us,” Lohn continued. “I know they will continue to get better as the season goes on. We just need to focus on the process of getting better, building chemistry, ect., and the results will take care of themselves.”