Jay Spoonhour is feeling the pressure to win, but he isn’t worried at all.

“With guys in athletics, pressure is not something that anybody worries about,” Spoonhour said. “There’s no nervousness, no tension, no anything. There’s just the pressure to do well. That’s the same for everybody in any profession. It’s what you use. You use it as a motivator.”

Flushing the aftermath of last year’s 12-17 record may take time with new philosophies and players, but the aforementioned motivation is being put to work now in the form of two-hour individual workout sessions, 12 hours total over the six-week, which provide an early feel for the roster.

“If we can leave these 12 hours with them understanding: ‘Here’s what will get you taken out of the game.’ that’s pretty good,” Spoonhour said.

Such infractions include not diving on loose balls, not taking charges, not pressuring the basketball and not giving maximum effort. Spoonhour believes it will not require all 12 hours to build and maintain the good habits, and part of it comes from the character of his players.

“These guys are really, really good kids,” Spoonhour said. “They really listen, and they’re trying. If you’ve got that, you’ve got a chance.”

The fact that many of these same guys are newcomers also hasn’t hindered the learning curve, since Spoonhour is new himself.

“They’re all newcomers to me,” Spoonhour said. “There’s no advantage to anybody because I have no history with anybody. Nobody’s done anything to make me mad; nobody’s done anything that I don’t like; nobody’s done anything that I think is great. So nobody is ahead or behind.”

For returning players, this fresh start in coaching, style and philosophy can have its perks as well.

“It’s great for the returning guys to have a clean slate,” Spoonhour said. “You always have stuff you wish you’d done better.”

On the subject of players joining the roster in the future, recruiting, which was recently enhanced by the lifting of the NCAA’s texting restrictions, is also looking up, though the staff will be taking it easy.

“It’s a non-intrusive way to get to guys,” Spoonhour said. “We’re not going to browbeat these guys. You can over-do anything. So am I sending 100 texts to guys? No.”

Though the entire squad isn’t on campus, Spoonhour is evaluating his players as far as strengths and weaknesses within the team and will take those into account while drawing up offensive schemes, but that’s for later.

“It’s a heck of a lot easier for me to see what we have when everybody gets here than it is for me to say ‘Here’s the system, you 15 guys figure it out.’ That’s not me,” Spoonhour said.

Spoonhour believes it won’t take long to figure out how he wants to set his players up on the court in November, but it may take a while for the team to gel and execute effectively.

“How many we’ll win, I have no idea,” Spoonhour said. “And how well they all get to playing with each other, that takes a while. When half your team is new it’ll take some time to get to where they can play well together.”

This makes the remainder of the summer critical as far as sharpening the learning curve for the future in order to give the team its best chances in the fall.

“Nobody on our team knows what it is that we want,” Spoonhour said. “Everything is going to be new for these guys: new terminology, new offensive and defensive stuff. And as a player, that’s what you’ve got to learn.”

Joshua Bryant can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected].