Newton High School Basketball Player Stephon Castle Voted ITG Next Georgia Male Athlete of the Month for January 2023
Congratulations to Newton High School boys basketball standout Stephon Castle. The 6-foot, 6-inch combo guard was voted as our January 2023 ITG Next Georgia Male Athlete of the Month, presented by Georgia Farm Bureau Insurance. Castle received the most votes among our four candidates selected for consideration of the award. The other candidates were McEachern High School junior forward Ace Bailey, Wheeler High School senior Isiah Collier, and Lambert High School’s Niko Wilson.
Castle is enjoying his final season with the Rams before he heads off to play for one of the top men’s collegiate basketball programs in the country, the UConn Huskies. He is a five-star recruit and is considered to become more of a shooting guard with the Huskies.
His high school coach, Charlemagne Gibbons, has been watching him play, and grow, since his eighth-grade season.
“I remember seeing Stephon play for the first time when he was between his eighth grade and ninth grade seasons,” the Rams coach recalls. “He was playing AAU and you could see right away just how talented he was. Those were my first impressions of Stephon.”
Gibbons says, however, that as talented as Castle is, it’s basketball smarts that truly separates him from the rest of the top players.
“Stephon’s IQ jumps out at you right away, and that along with his incredible talent enables him to do everything that any one through five type player [all positions] can do,” Gibbons said.
That’s no more evident than when Gibbons begins to describe the role that Castle plays for the Newton basketball team.
“He is our point guard, but he really does play all over the court for us,” the head coach says of his 6-foot, 7-inch standout.
Gibbons recalls when Castle was a freshman, he hit a growth spurt and added almost three inches in a year, which actually created a bit of an identity problem for him.
“Early on in his career, he was trying to figure it out as he went,” Gibbons says. “He struggled a little bit with his defense as a freshman, but he has turned into one of our best defenders.”
Castle is enjoying his senior season before heading off to Connecticut.
“The season so far has been super fun,” he says. “I feel like our schedule has prepared me to play at the next level, as well as prepared me and my teammates for the tough upcoming games we have.”
Castle leads the Newton basketball team in scoring, averaging 22 points per game, while pulling down 7.5 rebounds per game. But he says he enjoys involving the whole team in the offensive attack.
“I’m really confident and comfortable with my ability to facilitate and keep my teammates involved throughout the entire game,” he says, “and I’ve been working on getting back to being a consistent shooter from my spots and everywhere else on the court.”
