Tylie Biggs

Jumping in mid air, sophomore Nabil Ismail takes the shot while being blocked by Glenn’s defense on Jan 30. Ismail was awarded Newcomer of the Year, which is given to a new varsity player across the district who is a standout. “In my first ever varsity game, I was nervous about a lot of things, the biggest was if I was going to be able to make shots in the game,” Ismail said. “I remember being nervous up until I made my first shot and then from there I felt really comfortable and confident out on the floor.”

The squeaks of sneakers on the court are drowned out by the sounds of the student section’s shouts. The players look around for a way to get the ball past the other team’s defense. His teammate looks at him and within seconds the ball is his. He runs up the court and takes the shot. It’s in.

Averaging 9.4 points per game, sophomore Nabil Ismail was the second highest scoring player on the varsity team.The team made it to playoffs and finished 3rd in their district. He also averaged 2.3 assists and 5.3 rebounds per game and overall top five in every stat. On a district level, Ismail was ranked seventh for points per game, fourth in rebounds, and fourth in assists.

“This season was really fun and I enjoyed playing with the team, they’re all good players and they’re all nice,” Ismail said. “I appreciate the way my team fought through adversity, the difference between our team and others is that we all like each other and there’s no issues and we can all talk to each other.”

The game he was most nervous for was the first game of the season against Westwood. He said he was worried because of what he had heard about varsity being different than any other level of basketball. He said he was able to get over it and made his first layup in this game. 

“My biggest accomplishment this season was in the San Antonio tournament against Nixon,” Ismail said. “I had 22 points, it felt great because we won that game in triple overtime and I felt like I was able to contribute a lot to the team. My biggest fear when playing is not doing enough personally to help get my team the win.”

Ismail was the youngest on the team and he said that being the youngest on varsity was fun, but he had to earn his respect. Nonetheless, Ismail said he felt the upperclassmen made it easy for him to fit in and that one of the things his team is best at that helps him is the chemistry.

“We try to do team bonding outside of school at least once a week somewhere,” Ismail said. “Team chemistry is important because if you don’t have chemistry you are not going to know how each other play on the court and you have to be able to know what everyone’s good at so you can play the best as possible.”

Almost half of the team this past season were seniors, with Ismail only being a sophomore, he said he will miss their energy, enthusiasm, and how fun they made the season.

“They used to tell us how to do things and set us up for success,” Ismail said. “Reid Vines really helped me through this season, he had been playing basketball for a long time, been on varsity for a couple of years, and he was able to help me get accustomed to how things work varsity.”

Ismail has been playing basketball for eight years and when not in season for school, he plays for Centex, an AAU team, who’s season started in March. He played basketball for school all three years of middle school and practices by himself on his own time outside of school.

“My parents really pushed sports onto me and basketball always caught my eye as something that looks like a lot of fun,” Ismail said. “I have been working on my game and developing very well and the coaches have done a great job with me.”

He says his playing style is very balanced but Ismail prefers attacking the rim for layups and creating open shots for his teammates. Ismail says that he hopes his team can go to playoffs again next year and advance further. His personal goal is to average 15 points per game. In the future he hopes to play in college at a D1 or D2 school. For now, the team works on lifting and shooting to prepare for next year. 

“I was very happy that I did well on varsity just to know that I got to playoffs,” Ismail said. “I wanted to win that first game but it’s all good, I’m just glad we were able to get to playoffs because none of [my teammates] have gone to playoffs yet.”