NEWPORT-Fun and interesting were the buzz words bandied about as the Fighting Cocks and Lady Red took to the basketball court this week.

The teams hit the hardwood on Monday, which began the first official day of practice in preparation for their season opener on November 17 at Lenoir City.

The teams are looking to return to the successes they've seen the past two years, which include three second place finishes between the two and a district tournament championship for the Fighting Cocks in 2008.

Lady Red coach Wade Wester said that he hoped that fans appreciated and supported what figures to be another successful season for both teams.

"We have a great boys team and a girls team that's top two or three in the IMAC," Wester said. "I hope Newport and Cocke County understand what they have here is a chance to come out and watch good basketball."

Wester's squad returns to the hardwood off of 24 wins and an appearance in the district tournament championship game. Losing only two starters off last year's team, Cocke County still returns three-time All-Conference players Shannon Depew and Morgan Buda, who are becoming true leaders for their team.

"I really love leadership of my team right now," Wester said. "Shannon and Morgan have been the best players on the team since they were freshmen, but they really haven't been able to lead because they weren't seniors. Well they are seniors now and they are leading, by example, not just by talking."

The Lady Red underwent a grueling, disciplined practice on Tuesday morning and Wester said he seemed pleased with where his squad is three weeks prior to their first game.

"The team seems real disciplined, that was one of our problems last year, we weren't as disciplined," Wester said. "We have a long way to go if we want to be competing with the Morristown West's, Seymour's and South Greene's.

"I like where we are, I just hope that we are not satisfied," Wester said. "Our goal is to be the last team playing in the county."

Cocke County has had successful regular seasons the past three years, winning 60 games, but have failed to advance past the regional quarterfinal round each season.

It is something Wester said his team knows, but something that he isn't stressing to his team.

"This team has always won 20 games and then fizzled out, I hope we don't fizzle out but finish strong," Wester said. "It is something we can talk about. It's a carrot out in front of us that we know we can go get.

"I felt like last year I talked about it too much. That's all I talked about was the state tournament and IMAC champions," Wester said. "This year, I've got more of a game-by-game, day-by-day approach. I'm not looking towards that. I'm looking towards our next practice and that's tomorrow at 3 o'clock."

Meanwhile, Fighting Cocks coach Ray Evans is dealing more with getting into shape and getting acquainted with his players during his opening week of practice this week. Most of the returning players are still participating with the football team and will not hit the hardwood until next week.

Despite the absence of players, Evans treats the week as an extra week of practice.

"It's an extra week of practice the week I look at it," Evans said. "For some of the new guys, it's a way to catch up, it's a way to learn our drills and how we do them and getting the small stuff out of the way.

"I'm not going to start doing a lot of offensive plays and defensive plays until everybody gets here," Evans said.

Cocke County lost three starters off of last year's team, which went 11 or 12 deep at some points; but return experienced guard play this year. Senior point guard Marcus Stewart will start for the third straight year and will be paired alongside fellow seniors Jeramie Haney and Casey Ragan.

Even as they look to make an offensive impact, the Fighting Cocks used Monday strictly as a defensive work day. On Monday the team did not bring out basketballs. Tuesday's workout concentrated on the team fine-tuning some of their timing.

Cocke County will again utilize a fast-paced game and be reliant on their guard play without a true post player on the roster.

"We're going to be doing a lot of up-and-down the floor, right into our plays without having to stop and call something," Evans said. "So we are just working on our timing right now and emphasizing boxing out, not just rebounding, as small as we are - we've got to get a body on someone."

Evans said the style of play will make things exciting and interesting for the fans, even if the team is without a presence of a post player, after having relied on Travis Kelley and Hunter Dockery over the course of the past two years.

"It's going to be interesting because of our size," Evans said. "I'm the biggest one on the team and for a lot of places that's not good, but for me that is the way I like it. We're going to be a lot faster than we've been in the past."