The middle of July is the peak of the summer basketball season for many teams, as the Stellar showcase and SportsFest's A-town Throwdown dominate the local scene this time of the year.

It's also the same time of year that Freedom head coach Joe Stellato believes his teams start to turn the corner.

Freedom didn't make it to Sunday's action of tournament play, going 1-2 in pool play last week, but it did give its head coach something to take away from the summer encouragement.

Liberty and Bethlehem Catholic both made it through their pools and were eliminated on Sunday in the round of 16.

And despite Freedom's inability to reach the status of their city rivals, Stellato had nothing but confidence walking away.

"I'm very encouraged by what I saw from our teams over the past two weeks," he said. "I know that we can compete with the big boys now. We had all our guys at Stellar, but were missing a lot of guys at Sportsfest. This is usually the time in summer where we turn things up a little bit and that's exactly what we did over the past two tournaments."

The Patriots only victory in their three-game slate of pool play came against Warren Hills, coming away with a 45-26 triumph, but giving younger players experience to build upon was another lesson that proved to be beneficial for Stellato and his staff.

"SportsFest is a different format than Stellar where you have to get out of your pool compared to Stellar really being a tournament where you have to play your best every game," said Stellato. "I think you see a little bit of a drop off in the intensity levels early on at SportsFest because of that, but for us coaches, we're excited as anybody for any game. That's why I'm happy with our effort because we missed a lot of guys last weekend, but still competed."

As mentioned, Liberty and Becahi both made it through their pools and found themselves in the final 16 of the tournament.

The Hurricanes lost to Ridley 63-58 on Sunday to be eliminated from the competition, while Becahi lost to eventual champion Parkland 58-46.

With the rest of the summer league schedule now on the docket, Stellato knows there's basketball to be played into August, but admits that these two weeks are the most important.

"I think every coach uses these two weekends as measuring sticks for where they can be in the winter," he said. "You lose guys to football once August comes for the summer league playoffs, so we don't really worry about that. We worry about Stellar and Sportsfest and I'm walking away optimistic."