Bishop Gorman boy’s basketball has begun their quest for a three peat in the Nevada 5A Division. Practices, training sessions, and even games are all back on for the reigning back to back champions. 

Practices are taking place Monday-Wednesday, every week, some weeks even include Thursday or Friday sessions. The Gaels have been practicing for over a month now, ramping up the intensity, readying themselves for Section 7, and Cali Live. These two tournaments are the ultimate test, with teams from all parts of America coming together for competitive showcases. 

Each practice offers participants something different, but the Gaels have been focused on developing the skill sets of their players. Each practice holds roughly an hour of development time, they then run plays for about half an hour, and scrimmage for the rest of the time they have together. The team is starting to familiarize themselves with each other, with a completely different look than last year’s team. 

Gorman lost eight seniors from last season: Nick Jefferson, Kingston Carmona, Chris Baudreau, Nikash Garg, Dylan Unkelbach, Andrew Merhi, Brenden Bejaoui, and CJ Rabb. They are also losing two more key players in Jett Washington, and Ilan Nikolov. 

“We have a different team this year…” head coach Grant Rice said, “… once we figure each other out, everyone’s strengths and weaknesses and work on those, it’s going to be a really fun year.” 

Gorman has only 5 returning players from last year’s championship run: Kameron Cooper ‘27, Trey McKinney ‘28, Tyler Johnson ‘27, Dino Roberts ‘26, and Aiden Acuna ‘26. Also, with a 13-man roster this year, the eight new players look to find their role in the upcoming season.

This past weekend, Gorman got a taste of what their new team would feel like. Playing against Sierra Vista, and Basic Academy, winning both games by 40+ points. However, there were many things the coaches felt they could’ve done better, but this early in the journey, they have little to worry about. 

“We’ll figure out each other as the season goes on…” assistant coach Robert ‘Bobby’ Robotham said, “… but we have to uphold the tradition of Bishop Gorman basketball.”

Next week on Tuesday and Thursday, they’ll have a chance to continue upholding that tradition, with games at the Las Vegas Basketball Center. 

“It’s going to be a really fun year.” Coach Rice said.