Corky Kell & Dave Hunter Basketball Classic Preview: West Forsyth vs. Riverwood (Boys)

The second of five Corky Kell + Dave Hunter Basketball Classic matchups slated for this Saturday, Dec. 13 at Gainesville High School will be an intriguing cross-classification battle between Class 6A West Forsyth and Class 5A Riverwood. Both the Wolverines and Knights have spent the first few weeks of the season fine-tuning their rotations and working on hitting their stride ahead of region action. For Riverwood, head coach Buck Jenkins—just two years removed from the program’s first-ever state title—is working diligently on filling the void left by Class of 2025 graduate and Stetson freshman J.R. Leonard and 2024 grad and Louisiana Ragin’ Cajun redshirt freshman Karris Bilal.

“The last five years we’ve had guys that were really great scorers,” said coach Jenkins. “We had Karris Bilal and JR Leonard and both of those guys on any given night could get 25 or 30 points. And so anytime you have a season where you are losing that type of production, it is going to be tough to start. So from an offensive standpoint, you are going to have to fill those voids with the lack of scoring and it has been a challenge, because like I said last year JR was a senior and he was just able to kind of get buckets and this year’s group doesn’t have a guy like that so we are dependent on us running our sets and getting good shots and making the unselfish plays and those are necessary for us to keep up the pace with scoring points, so once we figure that out offensively I think we’ll be fine.”

Coach Jenkins and his squad have placed an emphasis on finding a consistent defensive set and believes that the offense will also progress as the season unfolds. Leading this mission will be point guard Tyson Sharper and South Cobb transfer Simeon Montgomery.

“Tyson Sharper, he’s a point guard and it has been exciting to work with him,” said Jenkins. “He sees the game very well and understands what we are trying to do with the ball on offense. He creates for other people and he can also create for himself and so anytime you have a guy that can make other people around him better, that is always a good thing and so I have been really excited to work with him this season. One of our other guys is Simeon Montgomery. Simeon transferred in South Cobb last year is where he was. He has been working his way in. He has had some struggles with consistency, but that just has to do with him being new to the system and him trying to figure out where he fits in, but he is a guy that we are hoping can get going really soon.”

Like Riverwood, West Forsyth is still working out its overall team identity and getting four of its football players back on the hardwood this last week has presented head coach Frederick Hurt opportunities along with challenges.  

“We are in a weird spot right now, because e just got our football guys back last week and we have four football guys,” said coach Hurt. “We already played four games without them, so we aren’t starting over, but we are back to square one when it comes to finding the chemistry and rotation. Nobody has it completely figured out at this point of the season, but we’ve spent four games playing one rotation and now that is changing so we are trying to figure that part out.”

Mason Page and Colt Muschara are both seniors that did not play basketball last season, but have been in the program before. Coach Hurt is optimistic about the toughness and leadership that both seniors bring to the lineup and they will work into the rotation with returning starters like Colin McCall.

“We have one returning starter and that is Colin McCall,” said coach Hurt. “We do have some other guys that got varsity minutes last year. We have another kid named Tommy Naso that played a lot last year and so did Yash Nadakuditi. We have a couple new juniors that are going to help us and of course Colt and Mason didn’t play basketball as juniors, so they are coming back to play again so they are not really varsity returners, but they have been in the program. And we have a couple sophomores that are going to help us out with Ben Elson and another sophomore named Connor Webb.”

WEST FORSYTH ROSTER

Head Coach: Fredrick Hurt

2, Jaylen Ivy, PG, 11

3, Grayson Paterline, W, 11

5, Pace Horstmeyer, SG/PG, 11

10, Tommy Naso, PG/SG, 11

11, Yash Nadakuditi, PF/W, 12

12, Mason Page, W, 12

14, Chase Little, PF, 12

20, Michael Ekpenike, W, 11

22, Zach Dupati, PF/W, 11

23, Ben Elson, SF/W, 10

25, Colin McCall, SG/PG, 12

25, Colin Mccall, PG/SG, 12

33, Colt Muschara, PF, 12

RIVERWOOD ROSTER

Head Coach: Buck Jenkins

0, Tyson Sharper, PG, 11

1, Ryan Patterson, G, 12

2, Myles Nobles, G, 11

4, Elijah Reese, P, 12

5, Kian Ghouchani, G, 12

11, Kaleb Bilal, G, 12

12, Simeon Montgomery, F, 12

13, Noah Cockrell, G, 12

14, Makenzie Wallace, G/F, 11

15, Nico Breton, G, 11

22, Kaden Newby, F, 12

32, Dariel Gomez, P, 12

50, Amir Cuyler, W, 9

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