Ready to reload: Veterans basketball gearing up for life after Thomas and Tone

PERRY — Chandler Thomas and Antonio ‘Tone’ Scott are gone, along with a huge chunk of the Veterans Warhawks’ offense.

Thomas and Tone accounted for 40 of the Warhawks’ 73 points per game last year, which is 54% of the offense from scoring alone. That’s not including the five other seniors who graduated.

There are still holdovers like Aiden Sweenor, Tristen Abner and Jordan Watson, but it’ll still be a harsh adjustment moving forward.

“I don’t know exactly the number, but approximately 80% of your offense has graduated,” Veterans coach Chip Flemmer said. “We’re looking at it this way: It’s an opportunity instead of rebuilding, we’re calling it reloading. It’s an opportunity for some of those guys that weren’t getting big minutes to come out there and show what they got.”

“We’re going to miss Chandler [and] Tone because they definitely were phenomenal teammates and players, but these guys are also excited because now it’s their chance to step on the court and show what they got.”

You got a glimpse of what the 2024-25 Warhawks will look like during Thursday’s play date in Perry, where they faced off against Bleckley County and Perry.

While you can take summer scrimmages with a grain of salt, it’s still an opportunity to see what adjustments need to be made before the season truly begins in several months.

To start off against Bleckley County the Warhawks looked aggressive with their double teams and knocked several balls lose in the passing lanes.

Just like last year, Abner was huge around the rim with putbacks or diving to the rim. He showcased more straight line drives from the perimeter, which could be something he ads to his arsenal now that Veterans needs more creation.

Watson also took on a different role from last year. He soaked up bench minutes in the guard rotation last year, but now he’s been asked to step into a lead guard role as he started in the backcourt with Sweenor.

“The thing with Jordan…he’s really good at being able to not only run the offense, but get his own shots,” Flemmer said. “It’s kind of like you can see sometimes Tone up at the top, you try to take it to the hole and things like that — Jordan can do that kind of thing. I think he’s at a point right now where he’s just trying to get a little bit more comfortable with the time on the court…You can tell he’s got a really high ceiling, and so now that he’s gonna get more minutes out there, I can’t tell you what he’s going to end up doing, but I think it’s going to be some pretty good stuff.”

Watson’s role isn’t the only one that’s changing. Sweenor and Abner will also have to step into a bigger position on the team now that they’re the seniors.

“They’re going to have to take on more of a leadership role…We want this to be a player-led team. When the coach has to lead everything and basically being the guy saying every single thing, those teams tend to struggle,” Flemmer said. “We even talked about it when we were getting beat there early in the game [against Perry]. I said, ‘This is a player led team, you guys gotta recognize what kind of defense that they’re in and we gotta adjust and take care of that stuff on the court. Because there’s gonna be situations where the crowd’s full and you can’t hear me talking, and so you guys gotta be the coaches on the court.’”

There is no replacing Thomas or Tone one-to-one, but Watson offers a dribble-drive threat, Sweenor can make some shots off the dribble, and Abner will always be a force down low.

There may be less dribble-drive and pick and role for the Warhawks — they leaned on ball movement around the perimeter during Thursday’s scrimmages.

Either way, a trio of Watson, Sweenor and Abner is enough to give Veterans a chance in any matchup. There’s still a lot to look forward to with Warhawks basketball.