Catawba Ridge basketball’s secret to success in Year 3? Growing pains, a little luck
Brett Childers didn’t recognize them at first.
A few weeks ago, walking past a trophy case on the entry floor of Catawba Ridge High School, the only boys basketball head coach in the school’s three-year history was stopped in his tracks. He looked at a picture of the Copperheads’ first-ever team and saw faces he knew. He read names he’d been calling for years.
“And I looked at it and said, ‘I don’t recognize them,’ ” Childers told The Herald, shrugging and chuckling. “No. 2? Jacob (Stevens)? He’s a senior now. He’s filled out. But he was hurt that year and looked like a little freshman there. And I guess he was just a sophomore then, but still.
“They’re young grown men now. They’ve matured. And that’s part of the process of growing a program.”
The Catawba Ridge basketball programs in 2021-22 have grown up considerably since the school opened its doors in the growing Fort Mill area in August 2019. They’re now each among the best in South Carolina 4A basketball teams this season.
The boys rank No. 9 in the latest S.C. Basketball Coaches Association poll. The girls rank No. 2. The programs have a combined record of 31-4 — by far the best in school history — and they’re doing it amid the toughest schedule they’ve ever played.
So what’s the secret behind their ascension?
How have the girls already earned the most wins in a single season?
How have the boys, a group that hasn’t yet earned a playoff berth or had a winning record, gotten so good so fast?
Growing pains. Hard work.
And perhaps a little luck, too.
Catawba Ridge girls’ basketball: ‘Coach, we’re 14’
Watching the Catawba Ridge girls, it’s like you can’t blink.
Any forced turnover turns into a layup. Practically every defensive rebound does, too. In a 30-point win over Region 3-4A foe Indian Land, the team only hit four 3-pointers and scored 64 points.
A lot of that playing style can be prescribed to the preference of the team’s first-year head coach, Sheridan Pressley.
Pressley, 26, grew up in Candler, North Carolina, a town in the mountains near Asheville. After graduating from Pisgah High School in 2014, she played college ball at Queens University in Charlotte, bringing some of that fast, Roy Williams-style, western N.C. flavor with her.
Right out of college, she spent a year as a head volleyball coach at another high school near her hometown but felt tugged to be back near the Carolinas border. And in July, that wish came true: Former CR head coach Kate Edwards left her post and accepted an administrative position at Nation Ford High School over the 2021 summer, and Pressley was hired to replace her.
“When I got the job, I knew we were going to be pretty skilled,” Pressley said. “And I preached to them from the start: All of our skill means nothing if we don’t put in the time and we don’t put in the effort.”
So her players did just that.
“If I was here 24-7, they’d be here 24-7,” Pressley said. One of the coach’s favorite drills? Putting 24 seconds on the clock and requiring four scores — down and back, and then down and back again — out of their primary fastbreak.
“And I talk about priding ourselves on putting in the work. They are always doing that.”
It’s paying off. Catawba Ridge has always had a good girls’ program. The team went 13-14 in Year 1 and 14-3 in Year 2. But these Copperheads are particularly special: They’re now 16-1 (3-0 Region 3-4A), their only loss coming against 5A state title contender Rock Hill High.
They’re led by a bunch of talent: Skyla Tuthill, a 5-foot-10 freshman who played at Columbia-area private school Cardinal Newman as an eighth-grader, averages 19.5 points and 6.3 rebounds a game. Fellow freshman guard Makailah Davis averages 14.5 points and four assists a game. Junior Tatum Postel averages 10.8 points and 5.2 boards a game.
Brielle Windisch (5.2 points a game) and Morgan Davis (5.6) round out the starting lineup.
Of the team’s 10 players, six are freshmen. And none are seniors.
“I forget all the time that I don’t have any seniors on my team,” Pressley said. She then laughed: “I’m like, ‘What are we doing?’ And they’re like, ‘Well, coach, we’re 14.’ And I have to check myself sometimes.”
Catawba Ridge boys basketball: ‘We’re not resting on anything’
The boys have seen similar success to their Copperhead counterparts this year. But they had to go through a few more growing pains in those first two years.
In 2019-20, they went 10-16.
And in the COVID-shortened season of 2020-21, they went 7-8.
But those struggles appear to be getting rewarded now: These Copperheads are 16-3 (1-1, Region 3-4A). Their only losses have come against 4A reigning state champion South Pointe, Charlotte Country Day and 5A Fort Mill — a cross-town rival they’ve played four times this season.
“They had to grow up really fast,” Childers said. “It’s really been one step at a time.”
Childers has seen quite a bit in his 20 years of coaching.
After playing college ball at James Madison and Bridgewater College (in Virginia), he moved around a bit before settling near the Carolinas border: He coached on the Murray State women’s basketball staff and spent two years coaching girls at another Virginia high school before moving to South Carolina and being a graduate assistant for his dad, Bud, who was a longtime women’s basketball coach at Winthrop. (Brett’s brother, Brad, is also a coach. Will Brett’s sons — Brady (8), Boyd (6) and Bennett (2) — be coaches, too? Brett isn’t sure.)
In 2007, he accepted the head girls’ basketball job at South Pointe and stayed there for six years before accepting the Fort Mill coaching job in 2013. Six years later, he was asked to lead the Catawba Ridge boys and took the mantle.
Being in the area so long, Childers has seen a lot.
He’s seen Fort Mill turn into one of the most desirable places to live in the Southeast. The Fort Mill School District has had to build two high schools in 15 years to account for rapid growth. And in that growth, as luck would have it, talented athletes have come through: The No. 1 runner in the nation, Sam Rich, won his second straight state championship in November, and the top-ranked football recruit for the Class of 2024, Jadyn Davis, was the team’s starting quarterback this past fall.
It doesn’t hurt, either, that the school has athletic facilities that rival college programs.
But when asked directly about what has made Catawba Ridge good so fast, Childers points back to the grind. Building, he reiterates, didn’t happen overnight. It took time.
And it took a team.
The Copperheads don’t have one star leading the way this year. They’re led in scoring by 6-foot-2 guard Grant Lovette, who averages 11.1 points per game, but have others who can go off any night: Sophomore Zyan Hager averages 9.3 points and two steals a game, while 6-foot-6 senior Carter Hendrick averages 9.2 points and 5.3 rebounds a game. And Landon Foley, Jack Turnbow, Jacob Stevens, Tyler France and Brady Ambrose all regularly contribute.
The job is far from finished, Childers said.
“We’re still not a finished product by any stretch,” Childers said. “We gotta catch the state champs in our region (South Pointe). And Lancaster is having a heck of a year. Those two have excellent coaches and are great teams. They’re tradition rich. We want to be there.”
It’s safe to say they’re on their way.
Upcoming schedule for Catawba Ridge
Jan. 24: at York
Jan. 26: at Lancaster
Jan. 28: at South Pointe
Feb. 1: vs. York
Feb. 4: vs. Lancaster
Feb. 8: at Indian Land
All are Region 3-4A games.
This story was originally published January 23, 2022 at 5:00 AM.
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