Lowell senior Roan Vasko’s most productive football season was a precursor. On the basketball court, Vasko has emerged as one of two players, along with junior guard Ezra Rumisek, to average at least 10 points and five rebounds for the Red Devils. “He’s come into his own,” Lowell boys basket ball coach Joe Delgado said. “He’s started to figure some things out.” Vasko made 84 tackles and an interception and also caught 11 passes for 195 yards and a touchdown as the Red Devils finished second in the Northwest Crossroads Conference and reached a Class 4A sectional championship game in their most successful season since 2021. Since then, Vasko has posted 10.0 points and 5.2 rebounds for Lowell (4-12, 0-3). The strong 6-foot-3, 185-pound guard also is a team captain. “He’s a leader on the court for us,” Delgado said. “He brings some of that toughness from football. They had a good year this year, so he brought some of that energy to here. “He’s in a whole new role this year, one he’s probably never been in his whole life. He has to be the guy that has to score and rebound and defend the other team’s best player and handle the ball. He has to do a lot of stuff, and that’s different for him. But he’s embraced it. He’s handled it well. You just love to have kids like that out there, just go out and do their job and work hard and put their head down, just having that toughness mentality.” Lowell’s Roan Vasko, left, drives to the basket against Kankakee Valley’s Brady Sampson during a Northwest Crossroads Conference game in Lowell on Saturday, Jan. 25, 2025. (John Smierciak / Post-Tribune) Vasko, who became a starter two years ago, said he has grown 3 inches and gained 15 pounds since last season. “Definitely my physicality and my strength and my athleticism have gotten better this year,” he said. “That just comes with getting older. But I sprung up in height, and it’s also the amount of time we put in the weight room.” Vasko said he’s looking for opportunities to shoot. “I’m a shooter — I try to be,” he said. “I’ve been working really hard on my shot. Obviously, it doesn’t always fall, but you have to keep letting them fly, keep shooting.” Lowell sophomore point guard Aiden Hernandez expects that from Vasko. “Roan’s a great teammate,” Hernandez said. “We rely on him to score a lot. If we’re in a slump, we just draw up a play for Roan and I try to get him the ball as soon as possible. “If someone falls to the floor, he’s sprinting over to help them up. He’s always in the locker room hyping us up at halftime. If we’re down, he’s always like, ‘Keep your head up.’ He’s just a great overall teammate. I love playing with him. He’s my shooting guard, and I love getting the ball to him to score.” Lowell’s Roan Vasko, left, hugs teammate Max Arredondo after Arredondo made an interception during a Class 4A sectional first-round game against Hanover Central in Lowell on Friday, Oct. 24, 2025. (John Smierciak / Post-Tribune) Vasko, who also golfs for Lowell, didn’t play football until he was a freshman. Then he sat out his sophomore season to concentrate on basketball. “I realized, ‘Oh, crap, I miss it. I think I should balance both,’” he said. “And that’s what I chose to do.” Vasko hopes he’ll have a chance to play basketball in college and could follow in the footsteps of his two brothers. Cayden Vasko starred in basketball for Lowell and is succeeding as a junior at Wofford after two productive seasons at Central Michigan. His oldest brother, Grant Weinmann, was a standout pitcher for Lowell and earned a walk-on spot at Louisville. “There’s so many different things, there’s so many different opportunities and different outcomes that can happen when it comes to this last half of the season,” Roan Vasko said. “It would be nice to go play basketball. That would be awesome. Even if it’s somewhere small, that would be cool. “Hopefully we can piece things together. Our teamwork is great. We’re so close as a team. We work really well together. There’s just a few little things we have to fix up. But we are all so close. We all want each other to succeed. We’re all working really hard as a team to better ourselves and better our record.” ...read more read less