As the writing of this article, Mechanicsburg currently sits in second place of the Keystone division, only behind Milton Hershey, and a lot of that is thanks to sophomore guard, Josh Smith. I had the pleasure to sit down with Smith over the weekend, and talk about the transition from football season, new coach Mike Gaffey and the difficult competition and look ahead to playoff basketball.
Before the basketball season started however, Josh played football. "We started working hard in the summer, and then even while we were playing football, we. were still doing stuff for Basketball. We were working hard all day, every day" Smith made sure to emphasize that even while during the football season, Gaffey had them working in preparation for the upcoming basketball season.
When asked about what it was like to be coached by someone with a legacy like coach Gaffey, Smith said "Gaffey has brought like new life to the program, and I've loved every moment of it. I loved Coach (Rutherford), but coach Gaffey, he has been amazing. He's kept this program going and kept and he brought us back on our feet and now we're just chugging along" Smith had nothing but praise to say about his new coach.
When I asked what make Gaffey so different, Smith said "He understands all of us as players really well. He understands our strengths and weaknesses and he is dedicated to the program. He studies film a lot, and makes sure we have the best game plan for every game." Smith heavily emphasized how Gaffey was an excellent player coach and really connected with the team immediately.
I also questioned if there was a specific team he was looking forward to facing, "I feel like facing Trinity would be a pretty fun match-up. Me and a couple of other teammates at Mechanicsburg have a bunch of friends at Trinity. So I feel like it would just be fun to play them. Milton Hershey would also be fun, or Hershey because of that loss earlier in the year"
I also asked him to pick between his two sports, basketball and football, and I don't think he could have answered it better, "I like the sport that I'm playing. So right now court it's basketball because I'm having a lot of fun with basketball. But then when football season rolls around in the fall, Love football" He's also a well documented Cowboys fan, which makes the fact that he likes football season at all, very surprising.
Josh and the Mechanicsburg Wildcats next game is on Friday, February 3rd, at home versus Palmyra. If you want to listen to the full interview, find Mid Penn Sports Weekly episode 24 on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Episode 24 will become available Tuesday.
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