AIKEN, S.C.--“Do more than might be expected” is how the dictionary USC Aiken Head Coach Mike Roberts keeps behind his desk defines the word overachieve. This year’s Pacer basketball team hopes to do just that.

"I think there is a lot of satisfaction in athletics when you can achieve things that others don’t think you can, there’s a sense of accomplishment there and I certainly feel like that’s something our guys could feel at the end of the year,” said Roberts, now in his seventh year of coaching the USCA men’s basketball team.

Roberts’ fellow coaches in the Peach Belt Conference don’t seem to think USCA will achieve a lot this season. After finishing 5-23, and 4-15 in the PBC, a year ago, the Pacers were picked by the league’s coaches to place 10th this season in the 12-team conference.

“I think overachieving is a very satisfying feeling. When your peers think you are at one level but you can achieve to a higher level than that. That is our goal,” Roberts said. “I fully intend to do everything that we can possibly do to have our kids walk away at the end of this season and be able to realize and feel that accomplishment.”

There is a host of Pacers returning from last year’s team that will try to accomplish what Roberts wants for his squad. Four starters and a total of eight letterwinners return for the 2003-04 season. Included in that group are the top four scorers and five of the top six rebounders from a year ago.

The four returning starters are seniors Bryant Latimer, Lee Burton, Minda Statkus and Todd Williams. Two of those players, Statkus and Williams, will not start in the same position they did last season and one, Latimer, may not be in the starting line up.

The 2003-04 team has eight returning players, but this is not going to be the same team fans saw last season. The addition of Mars Hill College transfer Curt Triplin will allow Williams to move from center to the power forward position and Statkus to slide over to the small forward spot, both of which are more natural positions for the two Pacers. Williams will match up better defensively with other team’s power forwards and Statkus will do less posting up and take advantage of his quick first step to beat people to the basket. By moving away from the three-guard line up, Roberts can bring Latimer, last season’s second leading scorer, off the bench, giving the Pacers a constantly fresh scoring threat.

The biggest question heading into the start of the season is who will be the team’s point guard? Four players are being considered for the spot, newcomers Trent Boyd and Cameron Conover and returning players Martynas Valaitis and Latimer, each of which brings different advantages to the position.

" What we have right now is four guys that are very different, and that’s a good thing,” Roberts said. “If we can get them to do the things they do best and stay away from areas they need to stay away from, we can use them in a way that we can make that a very solid position.”

Boyd, a transfer from Lander University, offers Roberts a very good ball defender with quickness and athleticism. Conover is a good off the ball defender and brings experience and an excellent sense for the game to the table. Valaitis, at 6-foot-3 and 198 pounds, is the biggest and strongest of the four point guard candidates. The senior worked hard over the summer and can play anywhere from the one to the four position. Latimer provides the most offense of the four and has experience running the Pacer system. Last season the Columbia, S.C., native often slid over from his shooting guard spot to give Eric Dugans a break at the point, averaging 2.6 assists per game.

"I think at that position we’re going to come up with a combination of guys, I don’t know that we are going to have one point guard that gets 30 minutes a game,” said Roberts. “It’s going to be a situational deal where depending on what we need in the game at any given time, we’ve got two or three or four guys that we can go to, to see if we can make the things happen that we want.”

Burton, last year’s leading scorer at 15.2 points per game, is holding down the shooting guard spot. He returned this fall in great shape, he’s shooting the ball very well and is focused on doing the things necessary for the team to be successful. Roberts will look for Burton to get to the charity stripe more often in 2003-04 and take advantage of his 79 percent free throw percentage.

"Lee is very much better prepared for the beginning of this season than he was coming in last year,” Roberts said of his top scorer. “His conditioning is better, he’s gotten stronger and he’s done a lot of things to prepare himself outside of our practice time that I’m real pleased with.”

Latimer, when not playing the point, will come off the bench and give the Pacers a one-two scoring punch. He averaged 14.5 points per contest last season and connected on 42 percent of his three point attempts. Not many teams will be able to bring a player of Latimer’s quality off the bench.

At the small forward spot Statkus appears to have taken hold of a starting spot but is being pushed everyday by Leroy Williams. Statkus can score from the perimeter and can get to the basket with a quick first step. He led the team in rebounding last season with 4.8 boards per game and averaged 8.7 points per game. Williams is a much more confident player this season. He contributed 3.1 points and 2.0 rebounds per game while averaging 12.3 minutes.

"Last year we were forced to play Statkus inside and he’s not truly an inside player but he did that last year because we asked him to, but he’s going to be a lot more effective in the position he’s at now,” said Roberts.

Todd Williams can be an all-conference candidate playing at the power forward spot. As a center last season, the senior led the Peach Belt Conference and was ninth in the nation with an average of 2.68 blocks per game. Williams finished second on the team with 4.3 rebounds per game while averaging 9.3 points. The move to power forward in 2003-04 will provide better match ups offensively and defensively for Williams and a chance for the Hopkins, S.C., native to increase his numbers. Senior Mira Jonuska, a very strong and disciplined player, provides depth at both the four and five spots. He shot 53.6 percent from the field last season and averaged nine minutes per game.

"I’m real pleased with Todd right now, he’s showed us that he wants to do what we ask him to do,” Roberts said. “He worked real hard in the preseason and right now he’s playing the best he’s played since he’s been here.”

Triplin, at the center position, brings a combination of strength, size and speed to the table for the Pacers. Triplin gives Roberts someone to combat the types of players that have hurt USC Aiken on the inside in the past. The junior can defend, rebound and score, and is a threat to produce a double-double every night. Last season for Mars Hill College, Triplin scored 8.9 points per game and finished second in the South Atlantic Conference with 7.6 rebounds per contest. Senior Jamall Gray begins his fourth season as a Pacer and will back up Triplin at the five spot. Last season Gray averaged 2.9 points and 2.5 rebounds per game. He set career highs with eight rebounds against UNC Pembroke and 13 points against Armstrong Atlantic State.

"The addition of Curtis Triplin has given us a big body kid that is very athletic that we can play inside,” Roberts said of his new center. “I think we’ve added a person to our lineup where we had a real void last year.”

The Peach Belt Conference will be extremely tough this season and could be more competitive than ever before. Coach Roberts sees Kennesaw State as the team to beat this season, with Columbus State a very close second.

"I know what Kennesaw has coming back and what they’ve recruited. I think they present some problems that Columbus isn’t capable of presenting because they’re bigger, they’re depth is good and they’ve got more size than most teams in our league,” Roberts said of the preseason favorite to win the PBC.

The Pacers will also play one of the toughest schedules in the league again in 2003-04. In addition to its 16 game PBC schedule, USC Aiken will play some of the best teams from the South Atlantic Conference (SAC) and the Carolinas-Virginia Athletics Conference (CVAC). Catawba, Wingate, Carson-Newman, Presbyterian and Tusculum from the SAC are picked to finish second, third, fourth, fifth and sixth in the conference. From the CVAC, USCA will play Mount Olive College and St. Andrews Presbyterian College. Mount Olive was picked to finish fourth and St. Andrews was picked sixth in the 11-team conference.

The 2002-03 season was a disappointment for the players and the coaches. However, they will not let the mistakes that were made last season carry over to the 2003-04 campaign.

“The feeling was at the end of last year, we can’t continue to do the same things we did and expect different results,” Roberts said. “If we want some different results then there are some things that we have to do differently.”

Overall Roberts is excited about the prospects of his team this year. He believes in the end, the strengths of this Pacer team; experience, size, athleticism and chemistry are the signs of a team that is ready to “overachieve.”

He offered this final thought.

“If we continue like we’re going now, I’d be sorely disappointed if we didn’t surpass what my peers thought of our basketball team and quite frankly I’m looking forward to doing that.”

USC Aiken’s final tune-up will be Nov. 15 when the Akron Wingfoots pay a visit to “The Courthouse” in Aiken for a 7:30 p.m. game. The Pacers will begin their 2003-04 season on Nov. 22 when they travel to Carson-Newman College in Jefferson City, Tenn. The game is set to tip off at 8:00 p.m.

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