Parkland High School boys basketball junior guard Nick Coval had one of the more successful seasons in recent program history in 2022-23. Coval averaged a career-best 22.6 points per game and went over the 1,000-career point mark this past year in leading the Trojans to their second straight District 11 6A title. He was also the East Penn Conference boys basketball MVP last season.

Last week, Coval joined a prestigious group, earning first-team honors on the Pennsylvania Sportswriters All-State Class 6A team, one of just six players in the state to achieve the feat.

“It meant a lot to me,” said Coval. “It was one of my goals since the beginning of the year and I worked extremely hard for it. To be honored like this is an awesome accomplishment for me. It is a great honor and I’m fortunate to have done it at Parkland. The program has had a lot of past success and a lot of great players before me so to do this is special.”

Coval said that he worked all year on getting stronger and faster and that proved to help him out on the court this past season. As a focal point of the offense, he knows he will be the focus of the opponents’ defense every possession. He scored 203 more points this season than last, and a lot of that has to do with getting to the basket more often instead of settling for outside shots.

“My strength is the factor of my game that I worked on the most,” Coval said. “My sophomore year I was afraid of contact because I wasn’t that strong at all, but I spent a lot of time in the weight room to change that for my junior year and it worked out in my favor.”

Heading into next season, Coval is looking forward to playing one final season with his teammates and coaches and hoping to win more gold. His recruiting has really picked up as well, as several Division I colleges have been vying for his services.

“I look forward to having another great experience with my teammates,” said Coval. “Obviously, we want to win, and we have won but making memories with your teammates is priceless. Recruiting has been good up to this point. I don’t have my list cut down, but I would say there are about 10 schools that have been recruiting me pretty hard as of late. I plan to take official visits in the summer and then make a decision sometime before the start of next season.”