Indians gear up for 2025-26 season

A new conference and a team that has been in coach Anthony Bowie’s system since day one of their freshman year could lead to a successful campaign for the Comanche Indians this basketball season.

Bowie was missing several players for workouts during the fall due to players’ participation in football, golf and cross country.

“We got them all in the gym, maybe starting the second half of November,” Bowie said. “Practices are going well right now. The kids are working hard. These senior guys I coached as freshmen and I’m coaching them now, so they know the system a little bit more. They know the things we are doing offensively and defensively.”

The Indians will be led by four seniors this year - Cooper Epperson, Hollister Pollock, Jonathan Alvarez and Bryson Goedhart. All bring experience to the table for Comanche.

This year the coach is emphasizing how to play in different situations.

“We work on how we want to guard, instead of just doing a bunch of different drills and skill work,” Robinson said. “We’ve really focused on trying to develop an identity for how we want to play.”

And it really is all about establishing an identity when it comes to success for this year’s Indians.

“We need to try to establish an identity - seeing if we can get really, really well at something and being able to lean on that whenever things aren’t going well, like if we are struggling to score or can’t stop anybody,” Bowie said. “We’re trying to get back to those fundamental skills and I’ve talked about that since the beginning and I think we’ve done a good job on those fundamental skills. We want to establish an identity on who we are offensively, defensively and collectively.”

Bowie said he had been working hard with the underclassmen to get them up to speed.”

“I’ve been trying to work with my bench a little bit, building my bench guys up,” Bowie said. “We’re expecting some contributions from our sophomores and possibly some freshmen.”

No doubt one of those sophomores will be Easton Bowen, who started as a freshman on last year’s squad.

The coach is also excited about the new conference.

“Some of those teams in our conference we scrimmaged last summer,” Bowie said. “We either beat them or played them in a close game. We beat Davis in a scrimmage last summer and our game with Little Axe was close. I think they beat us by one or two points in the summer. So I think the benefits of this schedule and getting a new conference are that it will give our guys some confidence and help them realize they are good basketball players.”

To start the season, Comanche’s starting five will include seniors Alvarez, Pollock and Epperson. Rounding out the lineup are junior Carson Vansickle and Bowen.

“It’s nice to have Carson back in the gym,” Bowie said. “He didn’t play his sophomore year so it’s good to get him back in the gym. He’s a really good one-on-one skill guy who creates his own shot and goes downhill. We have a few guys like that who can create their own shots. (Jonathan Alvarez) has developed really well inside and outside. He’s been working on his ball handling.”

The coach sees Alvarez and Epperson as the floor leaders.

“They are the quarterbacks of the team,” Bowie said.

Bowie thinks Bowen has the potential to develop into a top scorer. He also thinks his team will have some key players come off the bench, like Evan Gay.

Goedhart will be another key player off the bench as he recovers from a knee injury. 

“I feel good about any guy I can throw out there,” Bowie said. “Cole Pelton is a good one as well. He’s a high-energy guy, a rebounder and a guy who just wants to be in the mix of what we have going on.”

Pelton is also one of the taller players on the Indians at 6-2. They are not big overall. 

“We’re trying to coach energy, effort, activity and things like that,” Bowie said. “We’re similar to like we were last year from a size standpoint.”