MEN'S COLLEGE BASKETBALL: Savely Enjoying Stay At King

BY SPENCER CAMPBELL
BRISTOL HERALD COURIER

BRISTOL, Tenn. – Kyle Savely was on the move again.

After graduating from Corydon Central High School in Indiana, the 5-foot-11 point guard spent a year at Fork Union Military Academy, two years at Indiana Purdue-Fort Wayne and another redshirt season on the bench at D-1 Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis.

But IUPUI wasn’t working out, either. For the third time in four years, Savely packed his bags and prepared to migrate.

Exactly where, however, remained uncertain.

His old assistant coach at Fork Union said that he might know a place. This coach played for George Pitts in high school, and he knew that Pitts, the head men’s basketball coach at King College, needed a point guard.

A point guard, while very high on Pitts’ to-do list, was far from the only item on it.

After King won the 2007-08 Appalachian Athletic Conference title, its roster was decimated by graduating seniors, deserters, transfers and players Pitts wouldn’t ask back into the program.

Among the departed were Torrington Cox, the conference’s player of the year and an NAIA All-American, second-leading scorer Nick Pasqua (12.24 points per game) and the team’s top distributor, DeShaud Johnson (5.09 assists per game).

When all was said and done, Pitts could only count on three players returning to the team.

So Pitts did what any coach in his position would do: He recruited like crazy, starting with Savely.

There were no promises made sight unseen, but Savely soon received a call from Pitts. The coach asked the Indiana native to come to Bristol to work out. After that, Pitts said he would see if he had a spot.

“Honestly, before I came down here I was very hesitant,” Savely said. “But once I came down I just fell in love with the place. My last school was about 30,000 [students] and this one’s about 1,500, maybe.
“I really liked coach Pitts and really thought some good things were happening here. I wanted to be a part of it.”

Savely helped compose a 2008-09 Tornado roster made up of eight freshman, two junior college transfers and the three returnees.

Early fall practices, unsurprisingly, were a little raw. The team’s inexperience made chemistry difficult and left Pitts looking beyond this season’s conference title.

That hasn’t stopped Pitts from pushing his players long and hard, both in practices and in the weight room – just as he promised he would when he recruited them.

“I tell them and their parents, ‘My job is to make you the best you can be,’” Pitts said. “I’m a tough old guy who demands perfection, and I’m going to work your butt off and I’m going to get it.
“You’re going to get better or you’re going to decide this ain’t for me.”

Currently, Pitts said, there are only seven or eight Tornado players who are tough enough to play. One of those is Savely, who’s competing at a higher level than any other incoming player.

In the Tornado’s season opener, a conference game at Covenant, the junior led King to an 84-71 victory with his 19 points, six assists and seven steals.

He added 18 points and nine rebounds in King’s 88-60 win at Tennessee Temple, and another 18 points in the Tornado’s 72-44 romp over Allen University on Tuesday has the defending AAC champs off to a 3-0 start.

“He’s tough, he’s athletic, he knows I want the ball pushed,” Pitts said. “He pushes it as hard or harder than anybody I’ve ever coached.”

Even with the team’s inexperience, Savely will have plenty of help as he attempts to push King to the top of the conference for the second year in a row.

Mark Dockery, a 6-foot-5 guard from Twin Springs High School, is coming off a freshman year that saw him collect 11.24 PPG and the AAC Freshman of the Year award.

Senior forward-center Ben Bosse, a University of Tennessee transfer, returns as the Tornado’s top rebounder, averaging 5.06 per game in 2007-08.

With Savely, Bosse, Dockery, junior guard Craig McCargo, junior guard J.T. Blair and juco transfer Elisha Murray serving as the team’s core, Pitts expects freshmen Eddie Piccinini, DeShaun Greer and juco transfer Anthony Manuel to, “play a lot.”

But with so many new faces, Pitts is forgoing championship expectations in the hope that the Tornado are a tougher, much improved team by season’s end.

“I’m just a basketball coach,” Pitts said. “It’s not like we have a Mission Impossible. We’ve just got to work.
“It’s just a process and I think it will pay off. In two months I don’t think we’ll be a team that teams look forward to playing.”

scampbell@bristolnews.com|(276) 645-2543

AT A GLANCE
Nickname: Tornado
Arena: Student Center Complex (cap: 1,262)
Coach: George Pitts (48-19 in third season)
Last season: 26-8 overall, 16-2 in Appalachian Athletic Conference (1st in AAC, lost in first round of the NAIA national tournament.)
Key returners: Mark Dockery (Soph., G, 6-5), 11.24 points; Ben Bosse (Senior, C-F, 6-7), 8.77 points, 5.06 rebounds.
Key loss: Torrington Cox, 17.49 points, 8.64 rebounds.
Key newcomers: Kyle Savely (Junior, G, 5-11), Corydon, Ind.; Elisha Murray (Junior, G, 6-2), Ft. Myers, Fla.; Eddie Piccinini (Fresh., G, 6-0), Orlando, Fla.
Strengths: The guards. Newcomer Savely is lighting it up early and Dockery, the conference’s freshman of the year last season, should see an expanded role this season.
Biggest concern: Same as the king women: experience. How well will 11 new faces mesh?
Analysis: King might only have three players back from last year, but they’re good players. If some of the new players can step in and contribute significantly, there’s no reason the Tornado can’t challenge for the AAC crown this season.