Brian Gaetano was hired as coach of the Pine-Richland boys' basketball team only about four months ago, but that somewhat-rushed timetable hasn't been an issue for the Rams.

They open their season at 8 p.m. tomorrow when they play host to Summit Academy in their own tip-off tournament.

Gaetano, a former assistant at Shaler and a 1991 Quaker Valley High School graduate, was head coach at Springdale the past five seasons.

"The adjustment has been an easy one," Gaetano said. "The kids have been very cooperative and hard-working. What I love is that there are a lot of guys here who are 'basketball-only' guys, which is nice.

"It's something I never really saw at Springdale, being a much smaller school. So these kids have been playing a lot of basketball. The transition with the kids in terms of the work ethic and spirit of the parents and school has been a pleasant surprise since the first day I was here.

"Their attitude has been good. They aren't looking at this as if, 'Well, this is a new coach, the goal is to win in a year or two.' We all are looking at it that we want to win now."

Former coach Dave Krakoff resigned to take a new job in Florida. But he won't be the only member of last season's team, which went 13-10, who won't be in the Pine-Richland gym tomorrow for the dawn of a new season.

Three starters have graduated, most notably guard Brett Matson, who averaged 18.8 points per game last season and scored 1,354 points in his career. The Rams must find a way of replacing more than a third of the team's point production.

"It's a good challenge for the kids," Gaetano said. "In past years, a lot of them had been support players, role players, because Brett Matson was on the team and he was the section player of the year two years in a row."

Last season, Matson scored in double figures during 20 of Pine-Richland's 23 games. He was the team's leading scorer during a game 21 times. The entire rest of the roster accounted for only 27 double-figure scoring outings, and five of those came from another departed senior, Kevin Wissinger.

Even though a majority of last season's players are back, it's obvious many of them will have to score more for Pine-Richland to be successful in always-tough Section 3-AAAA.

"We know a lot of us will be relied on more for offense this season," senior guard Ian Hennessy said. "In the past it was more contributing with defense or in other ways, but now we know we have to look for openings to shoot and create. We know we have guys who will step up. We'll be a lot more balanced [offensively] this year."

Hennessy, an athletic 6 feet 2, is one of those players who figures to score with more regularity. He is not, however, a "basketball-only guy," having been the leading rusher for the Pine-Richland football team this season.

Arguably the team's most gifted offensive player is 6-foot-3 sophomore guard Eric Holmes, who was a key contributor last season as a freshman. Senior Tommy Johnson is another returning letter-winner with scoring promise. He will be the team's inside presence in the starting lineup.

Point guard R.J. White, a 5-9 senior, will again run the show on the court and Gaetano is excited about his quickness and ability to create scoring opportunities

While Holmes, Hennessy, Johnson and White are penciled in as starters, the remainder of the minutes could be spread out over a handful of players: 6-4 junior forward Eric Kordenbrock, 6-5 senior center Michael Felker, 6-4 freshman forward Andy Andrle, 5-10 sophomore guard Chris Rader, 6-6 junior forward Ben Brown, heady junior guard John Thompson and 5-11 sophomore guard Eddie Baranowski.

"I have a very competitive group of 10," Gaetano said. "I feel really, really good about the depth of this team. That helps us not only in games but it makes practices that much more competitive because there's not a lot of drop-off between those guys.