WHEELING — Many will call the Wheeling Central Maroon Knights boys basketball team ‘defending state champions’ for this upcoming season, after claiming the WVSSAC Class AA crown last year, but Wheeling Central head coach Mel Stephens doesn’t see it like that.”

“It’s always nice to be coming off of a state championship, but, like we told the guys yesterday– if we had everybody back from last year, then we would actually be defending our title. We do have a good number of guys coming back, but still, they realize that a target’s gonna be on their back and everybody’s gonna be gunning for you. So, it’s gonna be a tough chore, but they worked really hard in the summertime, in the preseason. I think they have the right frame of mind of what we need to try to do.”

Leading the way for Central is the reigning Evans Award winner, senior Eli Sancomb, who does it all for the Maroon, averaging 25.8 points, 10.5 rebounds, 5.3 assists and 2.6 steals per game in his junior season. He finished with shooting splits of 54.4/36.0/84.8 and was also named the Class AA state tournament MVP.

Committing to Liberty earlier this year, Stephens expects Sancomb to be in top form for his senior season. Sancomb is 24 points away from reaching 1,000 on his career.

“You know, I think him getting the commitment out of the way before the season started, I think is big,” Stephens said of Sancomb. “I think now he can just relax now that that’s taken care of. He can concentrate on playing a senior year this year and having a really good season. You know, West Virginia Player of the Year last year and everything, I think really his best basketball is ahead of him. I think when he gets to the college level, you know, he’s going to benefit from having other really good guys on his team that will make his game much, much better.”

Wheeling Central returns four players who had extensive playing time last year- Eli Sancomb, junior Luke Sancomb, senior Max Olejasz and junior Nico Kusic.

Luke Sancomb averaged 6.9 points per game last year, making 29 3-pointers at a 41.4% clip. Olejasz scored 10.2 per game along with grabbing 6.3 rebounds, both marks second-highest on the team. Kusic averaged 4.7 points, 3.4 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game.

Stephens also pointed to Steven Brodegard, a 6-6 senior, as someone to look out for this year. Between him, 6-7 Max Olejasz and 6-5 Eli Sancomb, the Knights could have height aplenty this season.

“Obviously, you know, Eli and Luke are back and Max. Those were three big guys from last year. But I think Steven Brodegard is going to open some eyes this year. You know, he’s going D1 in baseball, but I think he’s going to show some people this year that, you know, he can play a little bit of basketball, too.”

Also donning the maroon and white for the Knights this year is junior Levi Rine, freshman Nahiem Shepherd, freshman Dylan Blatt, junior Riley Taylor, junior Brayden Estep, junior Will Wear, junior Seth Wodusky, and sophomore Jackson Bell.

Graduates from last year were Tyler Dean, Dom Gianangeli, Troy Anthony and Braxton Billick.

Wheeling Central has a tough schedule this year, with several notable additions.

“We’re going to play Waverly, Ohio, which is a pretty good team there,” Stephens said. “We’re going to play St. Vincent up in Toronto in their Classic. We’re playing Aliquippa– I mean, we’ve got quite a few new teams on the schedule this year. You know, not exactly the way I’d like to do it. I mean, I like playing good competition, but I’d like to play a few more local teams if we could get them on the schedule, which just didn’t happen this year. But, you know, we’ve got a very challenging schedule. I mean, Marietta’s on there, we’ll go down to Logan, which will be a tough game. We’ve got a very, very challenging schedule.”

Stephens is assisted by Tyler Morando, Chris Stephens, Lance Bibey, and Boyd Bibey.