With the annual strength of the Northwestern football program, the early season boys basketball schedule is always written in pencil.

If the Tiger football team wins its PIAA semifinal against Trinity on Friday, then basketball’s opening night – currently scheduled for Tuesday at Northern Lehigh – will be pushed back because many of those same players are on the basketball roster.

That’s fine with boys basketball head coach Pat Wanamaker, who is among the biggest boosters of players participating in more than one sport. In fact, he’s planning on being at Friday’s game.

Whether they start Tuesday or at a later date, Wanamaker and the team will be ready to hit the court whenever the football team has completed its season.

As usually happens from year-to-year, the team will have a different look with the loss of three senior starters and two other seniors who came off the bench to play productive roles with the team.

Shane Marth, Gavin Nelson, and Eli Zimmerman have all moved on, which gives some opportunities to younger players.

Nelson takes his 1,390 career points with him. Zimmerman, a scholar athlete, was a spark plug both offensively and defensively, and Marth had a breakout season as a senior. Also gone are Nolan Fitzgerald and Josh Wambold, both strong players in their own right.

The three starting seniors averaged 42 points per game for the Tigers last season.

The Tigers finished with 24 wins last season, won the Colonial League championship and took silver medals in districts. That type of success will be hard to top, but the team is looking to not just repeat that, but also to upgrade its medal collection from silver to gold in districts.

“We graduated three all-league guys and two big role players,” said Wanamaker. “And we’re thankful for the work that they put in and their help dragging us to the top last year. We have a lot of really hungry kids and kids who put their time in and earned an opportunity this year. I am really excited to see what they can do and how they put their stamp on the program.”

This year’s senior group has Braden Berk, Mason Bollinger, Malachi Coleman, Cannon Fitch and Kaden Moyer.

There is reason to believe that the seniors can go a long way toward helping to fill some of the losses since they combined for just under 20 PPG last season in somewhat limited playing time. Brady Krimmel and Michael Lagowy had strong sophomore seasons for the Tigers and will see increased time on the court.

“My goals for my senior season are to be the best that I can, the best that the Lord will enable me to do,” said Coleman. “I just want to go as far as we can and as deep into states as we can; that’s where my goal is set.”

Coleman gives Northwestern good size and progressed well during last season’s run. He will step into a starting job with the team, looking to help both with offense and give Northwestern a rebounding presence.

Northwestern comes into the season off what Wanamaker calls “a historic season,” which it was.

The team had its highest win total in the program’s history and took their first Colonial League championship since 2001. The coach begins his third season at the helm and knows that relying on past success is not going to help his team this season. He’s looking for his players to write their own story rather than borrowing from last year’s story.

“What we (the coaches) really harp on is that last year is not this year,” said Wanamaker. “That season impacts this season as much as an 0-22 season would have. It’s an eyes front mentality. We just need to get better everyday and come late January and early February, be playing the kind of basketball that we can be playing.”

The early leadership hasn’t come just from the seniors who are not playing football. Junior Brady Krimmel has enough time on the court to step in not just for an added presence on the court, but to help fill any leadership void the team may have without their full roster in the gym.

“Us younger kids have had to step up while some of the older kids are still playing football,” said Krimmel. “I want their season to go as long as possible; I want them to win championships. When they get back here, we’ll be ready to go whenever that date is.”