By RYAN RICHTER

Staff writer

Entering his seventh season, Goessel High School boys’ basketball coach Curtis Guhr might have a dilemma on his hands: How do the Bluebirds better last season’s final mark of 7-14 overall while posting a rugged 2-8 finish in the Wheat State League?

That might not be the easiest thing to do, either, since the Bluebirds made the jump from Class 1A Division 1 to 2A.

Even with graduation and injury taking a toll, Guhr won’t have to start over from scratch, with a trio of starters returning, including a pair of seniors.

Guhr and the Bluebirds aren’t backing down from the challenge awaiting them.

“It’ll be tough, this area has several traditionally good teams in 2A,” Guhr said. “I hope our guys are up to the challenge.”

Gone is the quartet of Josh Schmidt, Rhett Makovec, Trevor Beisel, and Matthew Regier, all graduating.

“We graduated 4 seniors from last year’s team, two starters and two key guys from the bench,” said Guhr. “They will be hard to replace, but I look for it to be a competitive battle to fill the roles from last season.”

After a strong freshman season, 6-3 sophomore Dylan Lindeman will only get better as he gets older.

Averaging 10.2 points a year ago, Lindeman’s height enables him to see the floor to run the offense from point guard.

Something else working in the Bluebirds’ favor is the return of 6-2 senior wing Jordan Griffin.

Griffin averaged a team high 11 points and 7 rebounds a game and will be counted on for production in his last go round.

Carson Sterk logged a significant amount of minutes coming off the bench as a junior, but as a senior, Sterk’s time is now as he’s likely to break into Guhr’s starting rotation.

Outside of Lindeman, Griffin, and Sterk, Guhr’s team is short both in size and experience.

Senior Jayce Schmidt should fit into the backcourt, with Nathaniel Schmucker also a threat to break into the starting lineup.

Junior Zach Zogelman and the sophomore duo of Jerah Schmidt and Jacob Hagewood provide depth in the backcourt.

Without a lot of height, rebounding will be a big concern for Guhr, along with finding another scorer besides Lindeman and Griffin.

“Rebounding and defense will be keys to focus on in practice throughout the year,” said Guhr. “These other guys will have to step up pretty fast and fill the voids we have from last year.

“We’ve got 11 freshmen out and I look for them to push these older guys.”