The 2008-2009 men’s basketball season has included intense training and conditioning for the team.

According to Erick Schork, men’s and women’s basketball strength and conditioning coach, persistent training is the key to the teams’ success.

“The secret to success in training is consistency,” Schork said. “Each player must have 12 months of dedication to training and becoming better basketball players.

“My job is really to help enhance performance and increase work capacity of the players. Through conditioning, I help the players to increase strength, power, flexibility, endurance and limit the risk of injury throughout the season.”

Preparations for the season began in the end of June with freshman orientation. For about six weeks, lifting and conditioning took up the majority of the physical preparations.

“In addition to conditioning, the players would play basketball among themselves and with other basketball players in the area,” Schork said.

By mid-October, the team switched to in-season mode, working on strength and conditioning two or three times a week.

Even with the persistent workouts in the beginning of this season, head coach Rick Majerus remains unsatisfied with the conditioning level among his recruits.

“We just have a long way to go before the freshmen are at the point where they need to be physically,” Majerus said.

In regard to preparing the freshmen, Schork said, “It’s a matter of progressing in an effective manner. We don’t want to just throw everything at them all at once. There are eight freshman, and seven of them will play.

“We have a foundation of knowledge and strength to build. We must work up to what we want, slowly building what we need.”

Assessments of weakness among the players pave the way for improvement in certain aspects of the players’ training. Part of Schork’s job, he said, is to enhance each player’s particular strengths.

The players, particularly the freshmen, have shown physical improvement through their efforts thus far, and are continuously working to prepare themselves physically.

“Brett [Thompson] lost 18 pounds, all fat, but needs to lose 12 more of fat,” Majerus said. “Willie [Reed] will take a good amount of time to get a good body, and I’m hoping it comes in the middle of his sophomore year. Until then, he’s got to go incrementally. Kwamin has done a good job on his body, but I got him early.”

Schork said the players need to get a good base level of strength, work on conditioning their hearts and get their lungs in shape in order to handle the floor effectively. He added that Chaifetz Arena provides a level of motivation for improvement that is evident among players.

“Last year and the first part of this year, we were working out of West Pine Gym, and that’s like a dungeon,” Schork said. “The new arena and weight room motivate players even more. They see that the school has made a financial commitment to them.

“The school has made a financial commitment to us, and now, we must make a commitment to each other. If you work your tail off for your boss and he doesn’t care, you are less likely to work. We have seen that the boss does care and it really has boosted the energy.”