Pockat tabbed to lead Pirates, looks to build with defense

GILMAN BOYS BASKETBALL

A one-time assistant coach in the program under Robin Rosemeyer, Gilman high school tech ed teacher Tyler Pockat is back with the Pirates’ boys basketball program, hoping to lead the team back to prominence as its new head coach.

Pockat’s hiring became official at the July 17 school board meeting. He takes over a program that has struggled with inexperience and a shortage of natural basketball talent the past few years and carries a two and a half year, 58-game losing streak at the varsity level into the 2023-24 season.

There is light at the end of the tunnel as the arrival of Pockat and new assistant coach Cory Halida coincides with the expected arrival of young talent over the next couple of years that has experienced success in various sports while growing up and will hopefully mix well with some of the young talent that is already in the high school program.

Pockat and Halida as well as Gilman’s new head baseball coach Derek Nichols have sons in this up-and-coming group of athletes and have been among the main coaches who have brought them along. About seven to eight freshmen are ex-pected to join the high school program this winter. Halida and Nichols are Gilman alums from the late 1990s and early 2000s.

“I am excited,” Pockat said last week. “It should be good. There’s always going to be a learning curve with whatever kids you have, in whatever sport you have. When somebody new comes in, it’s going to be a little bit different for awhile. But I believe it will be good. There’s going to be a lot of expectations, but that’s good. If kids know they have expectations, that means they’re working for something.”

Pockat is a Shell Lake High School grad who arrived in Gilman via UWStout in the fall of 2002. The next year, Rosemeyer became the boys basketball head coach and Pockat was one of the assistants, a spot he held for nine seasons, including the WIAA Division 4 state run by the 2006-07 team.

“That was fun,” Pockat said. “To be honest with you, there is not really a better person you can work with or learn from than Robin. He’s so good. He gets the best out of everybody. He is just an awesome coach. So I was very fortunate to have done that with him.”

Eventually a growing family with his wife Sara led to Pockat stepping away from the high school program, but before long he jumped into coaching at the youth ranks, starting when his oldest son, Beau, hit fourth grade.

Learning under Rosemeyer and then adding his own tweaks along the way since then, Pockat has visions of what he wants to install this winter. Overall, he’s looking to establish a family atmosphere where players work hard, play hard and play for each other.

On the court, Pockat plans to build a foundation with a heavy emphasis on defense.

“Basketball is not just an offensive game,” he said. “I think we’re going to be more geared toward defense. I know you have to put the ball in the hole, but if you can’t stop someone from putting the ball in the hole either, it’s going to be a long night. I think defense is really going to be key for this year. We’re really looking at stepping in and making a difference on the defensive side.

“Definitely the working aspect of it I’m excited about,” Pockat added. “They’re all good kids. Hopefully they realize they can be in every game if they work hard on defense. You can be in every game. You can slow that game down and you can be in every game if you work your tail off.”

Offensively, Pockat said the Pirates will find out once the season starts what fits them best. He knows the program, as a whole, will still skew more toward younger players with only a few seniors and he and Halida expect to be stressing a lot of fundamentals early on.

Pockat takes over for Bobbi Marion, who was non-renewed after three years on the job. She took over the head coaching position just before the 2020-21 Covid- affected season at a time when the program needed someone to step in as a coach. While the Pirates fell short in the win column last season in 23 games, they were noticeably improved and had shots to win a handful of contests.

“It’ll be fun,” Pockat said. “There will be a lot of learning that will have to take place. We’re going to have to re-visit some things to start out the year.

“I hope to bring a lot of passion to the game. We’re going to definitely focus a lot on our defensive game, working hard and treating everybody like a family member.”