Van-Far boys basketball is more ready to get off and running this season.

The Indians return a junior class that led them to a second-place finish in districts a year ago in what was a 10-17 season, with half of those wins earned in five of their last eight games.

“That's what we always want. We want to be playing our best in February,” head coach Pat Connaway said. “It’s one of those things where, with the kids, it just started clicking (last year). It’s our third year of really running that style of offense, and they just started figuring it out, making reads and playing basketball.”

Running is the key word when it pertains to the offense as Connaway said Van-Far likes to run “when it can,” usually through the use of a full-court press, but would also like to be “methodical” in the half court. He said the Indians have had much speed and athleticism for years and that will be the case this season as well.

At the forefront of that junior class is his son Nikos Connaway, whose averages of 19.2 points, 7.1 rebounds, 4.5 assists and 2.7 steals and 41 percent shooting average from the field earned him unanimous selections to the Eastern Missouri Conference and all-district teams and an all-region nod. Gage Gibson was the second-leading scorer at 9.9 points per game while hitting 33 percent of his 3-pointers.

Carter Jennings has grown to 6-for-3, Pat Connaway said, and is hoping Jennings grows as a player to have a breakout season. Brayden Lay brings back a 7.4 scoring average and hopes to have a breakout season of his own.

Leading the group of freshmen Connaway looks forward to introducing to the rotation this season is Evan Utterback and Pacey Reading, who is the son of assistant coach Brett Reading to bring the total of coaches’ kids on the floor to two.

“We’re kind of weird,” Connaway said. “We don’t have many seniors and we don’t have many sophomores. We put the freshman in a tough spot this summer. In junior high, they’re the biggest kids. They’re all around 6-1 or 6-2. Well, big in junior high isn’t big in high school. That’s what we want to get them used too.”

Connaway said he expects much of this group, which is why he has the Indians playing against tough competition in tournaments like the Centralia Invitational. Van-Far will be in that field again, which Connaway said may cost the team wins but will ultimately pay off after having experience against teams like Harrisburg, Macon and Salisbury.

Van-Far upset the No. 1 seed Cairo in districts last season and fell short by 10 points against the No. 2 seed Clopton. The year before, the Indians played in the district semifinals so Connaway said it makes sense that their goal this season would be a district title.

“Win or lose, preferably win, when the night’s over, we want that other team to say, ‘Hey, that Van-Far team plays hard. They do things right. They have great character. They have great kids,’” Connaway said. “That’s what we’re striving for.”