{"id":791,"date":"2012-01-14T12:46:52","date_gmt":"2012-01-14T17:46:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/?p=791"},"modified":"2012-01-14T12:47:59","modified_gmt":"2012-01-14T17:47:59","slug":"timmy-maloney-is-the-packet-athlete-of-the-week","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/archives\/791\/","title":{"rendered":"Timmy Maloney is the Packet Athlete of the Week"},"content":{"rendered":"

Princeton Packet athlete \u00a0of the week \u00a0click here<\/a><\/p>\n

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There have been times this season when Kris Grundy wasn\u2019t sure if he would have Tim Maloney available on the court.<\/p>\n

\u201dHe hurt his back in the spring and it shut him down in the summer,\u201d the Montgomery High boys basketball coach said. \u201cHe still came to everything we did, but he didn\u2019t do summer league or participate in camps except for the last one and in that one he only played a few games.<\/p>\n

\u201dThe first day of tryouts he wrenched his back and we didn\u2019t know if we would have him at all. He started the season playing 16 minutes a night and when his back responded well we upped it and then against Bridgewater he played 30 of 40 minutes and since that time his minutes have been steadily in the 24-minute range.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Cougars have certainly benefited from having their only returning starter on the court as much as possible. Maloney has averaged 8.6 points and 6.9 rebounds a game through the first nine games of the season, helping the Cougars to an 8-1 start \u2014 including five straight wins as they look to earn a third straight Skyland Conference division title.<\/p>\n

\u201dThis was a tough five-game stretch starting with Bridgewater and Princeton, so it felt good to cap it off with a win against Immaculata,\u201d Maloney said. \u201cWe have a good rivalry with them.\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n

Maloney did his best to keep the Cougars moving forward. He had 10 points, six rebounds and six steals in a 53-35 win over Westfield, then had nine points, five rebounds and five steals in a 42-40 win over Somerville. He capped the week off with 15 points, 10 rebounds, five assists and two steals in a 57-39 win over Immaculata.<\/p>\n

Tim Maloney is the Princeton Packet Athlete of the Week.<\/p>\n

\u201dI have had to step into a bigger role of being a leader, which is nice,\u201d Maloney said. \u201cI always looked at myself as a leader and now these young kids look to me for help besides the coaches. It is a good thing. I can give them information and teach them. With them being so young, they have a lot to learn and are willing to learn and listen. They listen to me and also to our other captain, Brendan Fay. All the seniors are leaders and we all help each other.\u201d<\/p>\n

With Maloney as the only starter back for the Cougars, this could have been a season of rebuilding \u2014 especially since Maloney has been dealing with a back injury. Instead, the Cougars have won eight of their first nine games.<\/p>\n

\u201dI have not been that surprised with this team,\u201d Maloney said. \u201cThe thing with our team is these new guys come to work every day and work hard every day in practice. The record and the wins are not a surprise because of how hard they have been working since the fall and summer.<\/p>\n

\u201dGuys have been working all year-round on the sport and done great. Some of the guys are inexperienced, but they can all flat out play.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grundy appreciates the way his team has worked, and the way Maloney has worked himself back onto the court despite his injury.<\/p>\n

\u201dI am lucky to be part of a group that has worked so hard since the end of last season,\u201d the Montgomery coach said. \u201cThis is such a committed group. When I first took over as head coach, when people mentioned Montgomery High athletics I don\u2019t know how many people thought about basketball.<\/p>\n

\u201dBut I have been lucky to have such hard working kids from that first year when I took over. It started way back then and now when these guys step on the court all they ever know is winning.\u201d<\/p>\n

The start to this season has been impressive, and Maloney hopes it will continue.<\/p>\n

\u201dWe\u2019re just getting going,\u201d he said. \u201cWe still have goals of raising banners for conference, county and states. This year and last year are similar. Both teams lost big players from the year before. Last year we lost to Somerville, we lost to Immaculata, and we lost to Bridgewater.<\/p>\n

\u201dThis year in the regular season we have started out accomplishing more than last year. We won at Somerville, beat Immaculata, and gave Bridgewater their best game yet. I think we could have won that. We know we have a long way to go but we have started off well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now the Cougars just need to keep Maloney healthy as the season grinds on.<\/p>\n

\u201dOnce the adrenaline kicks in, it really is fine,\u201d Maloney said of his back. \u201cSometimes with breaks or time outs it gets stiff or tight. But I have been icing it and doing what I can to keep healthy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Added Grundy: \u201cAgainst Immaculata he wasn\u2019t thinking about his back. He was just playing like he played last year. He had a big dunk in the game where Justin (Kovacevich) stole it, Timmy broke loose and hammered it down.\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n

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Princeton Packet athlete \u00a0of the week \u00a0click here \u00a0 \u00a0 There have been times this season when Kris Grundy wasn\u2019t sure if he would have Tim Maloney available on the court. \u201dHe hurt his back in the spring and it shut him down in the summer,\u201d the Montgomery High boys basketball coach said. \u201cHe still […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-791","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=791"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":793,"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791\/revisions\/793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=791"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=791"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mhsbasketball.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=791"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}