Huntingdon's boys basketball learning to play through adversity

ATWOOD — Jonathan Kee and his team have been in this position before.

Basketball practice has gotten underway. However, Kee looks at his team and feels a bit of emptiness. Players are missing because they are still playing football.

More: Jackson area high school basketball Week 9 scoreboard.

During that time, practice wasn’t easy. The Mustangs were short handed and the players who didn’t play football had double the workload.

“It was pretty hard for us,” senior Jeremiah Pearson said. “We only had about seven people.”

At a school like Huntingdon, football is king. Once the season ended, Kee got back the majority of his roster.

It's something he deals with at the start of every season. It's a challenge. 

“For us, I’ve always looked at our first part of our season — which usually doesn’t get started until December because of football — it’s kind of our summer time,” Kee said.

Adversity struck those first few weeks. The Mustangs started 1-3. However, they fought through it and are now riding a five-game winning streak after Huntingdon defeated West Carroll 59-54 in a District 11-A contest on Monday night.

This Huntingdon team is different than years past. Even when the Mustangs are down, Kee can look at his team in the huddle and see in their eyes they aren’t going to go down easily.

More: Five inductees announced for Jackson-Madison County Sports Hall of Fame.

“The thing I like about this basketball team, it’s not always pretty, but when we get down in a basketball game or we hit some adversity through the course of a game, we just continue to fight,” Kee said. “Sometimes I can’t always say that was the case in the past, but this team really focuses and perseveres through adversity.”

It’s the leaders on the team like Pearson who help Huntingdon overcome its deficits. Kee relies on his four seniors to get the job done. He tells his team not give up. It goes a long way for their psyche when the Mustangs are trailing in a game.

“He says that every time,” Pearson said. “It makes us feel good because he knows we have the mindset to come back.”

Huntingdon (12-6, 7-1) is in a good position in District 11-A. The Mustangs are on the inside track on getting a top-2 seed in the district tournament.

While a five-game winning streak sounds good on paper, Kee doesn’t his team to be playing their best basketball right now.

He wants them to be at their best heading into February,

“I don’t want to be peaking for about two or three more weeks,” Kee said. “We’re by no means where I think we can be.”

Reach Luis Torres at ltorres1@jacksonsun.com or 731-425-9638 and follow him on Twitter @LFTorresIII.