Chris Fite knew the truth about the request he made of Markus Frank.
“It’s not easy redshirting,” said Fite, now in his 10th season as Shippensburg’s men’s basketball coach. “Having to spend that first year not getting to play and getting some of the rewards for the day-in, day-out work that you put in, it’s certainly beneficial when you make it through that process.”
Frank – a 2022 Quaker Valley graduate who helped lead his school to its first WPIAL championship since 1997 as a senior – is proving Fite right.
After redshirting last winter, Frank is averaging a team-high 20.2 points per game for Fite’s young Shippensburg team this season, while also contributing 7.1 rebounds per game, with a Raiders-best 16 steals.
“It’s been fun so far,” Frank said. “I’m playing well. Our team hasn’t been playing too bad. As long as we keep winning I’m sure everything will stay the same. I’ll keep doing my thing and as long as we keep winning, I’m OK with it.”
Frank is currently the fourth-leading scorer in the NCAA Division II Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference. The 6-foot-4, 180-pound guard/forward is making 44% of his shots from the field, which is good for second among Shippensburg’s regular starters.
“He’s been great for our program,” Fite said. “We knew what a talent he was coming out of high school, could definitely see the potential there as far as how that might translate at the college level. He’s come in and really worked hard and has done everything we’ve asked of him.”
For Frank, that started with how his first year on campus in Shippensburg went.
“Obviously I wanted to play but, to be honest, the whole year it wasn’t that bad for me because I was still practicing with the team and stuff, and I knew I was going to be able to practice with all the older guys, too,” Frank said. “When they would go off to games or something like that I would just get in the gym and shoot, maybe even at the Rec, just get extra shots up.
“It was definitely different having to watch games and not being able to play,” he added. “It definitely made me a lot more hungry to play and show everybody what I could do.”
Frank, who averaged 28 points per game as a senior at Quaker Valley, said he has always leaned on his innate ability to get to the rim and score.
During his recruiting process, Fite said he had discussions with Quakers coach Mike Mastroianni about the type of well-rounded player Frank might be able to become at the next level.
“He’s coming from a very good program,” Fite said. “Coach Mastroianni does a great job with Quaker Valley, and obviously Markus was a great scorer at the high school level. He was unique in that he rarely ever shot the ball from the perimeter because of his ability to get to the rim.
“I’d imagine his mindset was, ‘Why do I need to shoot from the perimeter when I can get to the basket or get to the foul line?’”
And so a natural concern crept in for Fite.
“There was always that question mark, is he going to be able to shoot, is he going to be able to do those things at this level against better athletes and older players and things like that?” Fite recalled. “Coach Mastroianni always said, ‘Markus can shoot it. He shoots well in practice and in the drills that we do he just opts not to in game.’ Certainly that has proven true here.”
Frank is averaging a 30% shooting percentage from beyond the 3-point arc, which has added a new element to his game and has contributed to his early success at the collegiate level.
In a Dec. 1 game against Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Frank exploded for 40 points, making 14-of-21 shots from the field and 10-of-15 attempts from the free-throw line. He was the first Shippensburg player to score 40 points in a game in 28 years and the first Raider to achieve the feat in regulation in 37 seasons.
“The sky is the limit,” Fite said. “Right now, it’s he’s young. We’ve had freshmen come through the program that have played very limited minutes as freshmen and ended up being Players of the Year and things in the conference come their junior and senior seasons. You obviously, as a coach, get excited about the possibilities there.
“Now it’s just a matter of getting him to feel good about the things he’s accomplishing but also kind of identify some of the other areas in his game and say, ‘All right, now you’re doing this, but let’s see if we can work on some of these elements to make you even more rounded and even more dangerous.’ ”
That’s exactly what Frank intends to do.
“The more I get experience, the more games I play, I feel like the better I’m getting used to what I have to do,” he said. “I have to change my play style a little bit to accommodate for that.”
Frank said he leans a great deal on support from his teammates in his development on and off the court. He added the Raiders starting lineup that includes a decidedly WPIAL flair only helps in that regard.
Graduate student Andrew Recchia, a Mars product, along with junior Michael Dunn, a Trinity graduate, are starting guards for Shippensburg this season.
Chartiers Valley product Drew Sleva, whose brothers Dustin and Dom are among the Raiders’ all-time leading scorers, is in his freshman year at Shippensburg.
“Since it’s kind of far away from home, it’s nice having other people you can kind of relate to,” Frank said. “We rep [Western] Pa. all the time on our court, in our gym.”
Dunn averages 9.3 points per game and is shooting 40% from beyond the 3-point arc.
Recchia, whom Fite described as the quintessential point guard, averages 4.9 points per game but has a team-high 35 assists to just 13 turnovers. His 2.7 assists-to-turnover ratio is third best in the PSAC.
“We’ve had a lot of success recruiting WPIAL kids,” Fite said. “I feel as though we’ve developed — our program has a bit of a reputation — and I think the guys know what they’re getting into coming over here to play for me and play with some of their friends from that area. We’ve managed to put together a good run here with the core being from out west. We’re hoping to keep it rolling.”
Frank said he also draws a lot of support from his best friend playing just south of Pennsylvania.
Kentucky sophomore guard Adou Thiero, who was Frank’s classmate at Quaker Valley, is a regular in the Wildcats starting lineup under coach John Calipari, who is a Moon native and former standout basketball player at Clarion University of Pennsylvania and Pitt.
Thiero, a 6-foot-8, 222-pound guard, is averaging 7.7 points and 5.8 rebounds per game, while shooting 53% from the field, in his first season starting at Kentucky.
“Me and Adou talk every day, honestly,” Frank said. “He’s still my best friend even though high school is over. We still talk a lot. I get to hear what his experience is like. He hears what my experience is like. We just bounce those ideas off each other. He tells me what I can do better. I tell him what he might be able to do better, too.”
John is a copy editor and page designer at the Post-Gazette, but he's currently on strike. Email him at jsanta@unionprogress.com.