Almont, Imlay City begin new chapter of their rivalry in boys basketball

IMLAY CITY — Despite being archrivals, the Almont and Imlay City boys basketball teams have a lot in common this season.

Both the Raiders and Spartans feature an abundance of young players.

"We're very new this year," Almont senior Clay Roszczewski said. "We only have three or four returning varsity players. But we've really bonded over the past two or three weeks that we've been playing. Everything is starting to mesh together. We're not quite there yet to secure a few wins, but we're hoping to get there."

"It is different playing with a whole completely new team," Imlay City senior Beau Hund said. "But I'm looking forward to building a new connection with them."

"I like our guys," Imlay City coach Don Gauthier said. "They're very coachable. They work really hard, they want to get better and they want to put the time in. We just need experience ... we're kind of learning on the fly."

The other similarity between the two programs? Both are coached by members of the same family.

"It's a little different to have two brothers at rival schools in the same league," said Almont coach Ross Gauthier, who is Don's younger brother. "We don't talk to each other about our teams as much as we did when I previously coached in a different league."

The older sibling got the last laugh Friday, as the Spartans slipped past the Raiders, 49-47, at home in the BWAC opener for each team.

Hund finished with 13 points and scored the game-winning floater with 1.2 seconds left as Imlay City improved to 3-2. Roszczewski totaled 17 points for Almont, which fell to 1-3.

"It's bittersweet," Don Gauthier said of getting a win against his brother. "Honestly, I really (wasn't) looking forward to this. But I'm glad we won."

"Our kids played hard," Ross Gauthier said. "I couldn't ask them to do anything more. They battled. Every time Imlay City made a run, we'd answer back with a run ... we just ran out of time."

While Hund and Roszczewski are no strangers to the stage, they were aided by some newer cast members.

Imlay City's JD Trout (12 points, 10 rebounds) and Almont's Marko Radisavljevic (13 points) each had their own stretches of dominance.

"(Trout) can be a difference maker for us," Don Gauthier said. "He started off a little slow, but the last couple games he's played pretty good. He played pretty good against Detroit Douglass on Monday and I thought he played really well tonight ... we need him to play well."

"(Radisavljevic) is the stuff," Ross Gauthier said. "He works on his game a lot and plays hard ... he's a great kid. Confidence comes from hard work and he's put a lot of (it) in."

"Ever since I was seven, I've just been training three or four days a week," Radisavljevic said. "Just attacking the basket and working on my midrange (shot) a little bit."

That's a good habit to have, because everything is a work in progress for Almont at the moment. While Ross Gauthier has been the school's athletic director since 2018, this is his first season as coach of the Raiders.

"We're gaining experience and our best basketball is ahead of us," Ross Gauthier said. "We're trying to figure this stuff out. But we're headed in the right direction."

"We're building a new program now with a new coach," Roszczewski said. "So I hope to get some really good stuff put in for the future. Also, our definite goal is to win as many games as possible ... we just want to do as best we can."

The situation is a bit different at Imlay City, where Don Gauthier has been the coach — as well as the school's athletic director — for over a decade. Still, the Spartans are adjusting to their own set of changes.

"I hope we become a really good defensive team," Hund said. "We don't have a lot of height, but we have a lot of grit on our team."

"It's been different guys stepping up in different games (for us)," Don Gauthier said. "We've got great kids. They're gritty ... we've just got to keep battling."

Contact Brenden Welper at bwelper@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @BrendenWelper.

This article originally appeared on Port Huron Times Herald: Almont, Imlay City begin new chapter of their rivalry in boys hoops