The old ball coach is back at it.

More than three years after Chico Furtado last coached at Kalaheo — the school he had long been synonymous with for over 20 years — Furtado is a the forefront of a resurgence at another school that he knows all too well.

In just his second season as head coach, Furtado has helped to elevate the Maryknoll girls' basketball program from a Division II team to a Division-I contender at the state level in 2013.

The Spartans are off to an 11-1 start this year, including a 2-0 mark in the competitive Interscholastic League of Honolulu. Furtado, who has been a counselor at the small, private school for the past 25 years, inherited a team that came off of back-to-back third-place finishes in the D2 state tournament under former coach Steve Caley.

"After I left Kalaheo and sat out a year, Steve asked me to help out with the (Maryknoll) girls' team," Furtado recalled. "He needed to step down after the 2011-2012 season because he had just had a second child and time was a consideration and he asked me to take over."

Furtado, the fiery veteran coach, didn't exactly jump at the opportunity, instead carefully weighing the repercussions before coming to a decision.

"I told our (athletic director) when I took the job, that there's an intensity about me that is different when that ball gets thrown up and I hope the school, the kids and the program can handle that because I hold people accountable," Furtado said. "I hold kids accountable for their play, for their attitudes and if they fall short of that, there's going to be some tough times."

Furtado eventually accepted the position and relished the opportunity to coach where he's worked for so long.

"I really like coaching at Maryknoll. Part of it is that I have an association with Maryknoll — I've spent almost half my life there — so to be able to now be involved in something that's been a part of me my entire life in basketball and to be able to bring that to my school that I've worked for, it's really the best of both worlds," Furtado said. "I get to form relationships with the players outside of the competitive arena. I see the kids in school everyday, I talk to them, counsel them. It's a connection that goes beyond basketball. It's what Pete Smith had at Kalaheo that I didn't have. I would go to practice for two and a half hours then leave and I didn't have that connection to the kids as students, but now I do and it's something that has been a blessing for me everyday."

Both the girls and boys basketball teams have experienced an increased amount of success in recent years. The Spartan boys won the ILH D1 title last year and finished second in the state tournament after a thrilling championship game loss to Kalaheo.

"I think it kind of goes hand-in-hand with the redirection of athletics and what we're focusing on," Furtado said. "We built a multi-million dollar athletic facility and it makes no sense to try and put teams in there that are competitive. Basketball has always been the flagship program at Maryknoll and now to have our own gym, a place where we can call home and when that's coupled with the legacy of basketball we have — albeit 30 years ago — everything kind of fell in place and we're trying to build one year at a time. We're trying to get our share of the pie."

Furtado's team is proving that they belong through its play on the court. The Spartans have defeated some quality teams in Kaiser, Farrington and Hilo in preseason games and opened ILH play with wins over perennial league powers Punahou and Kamehameha last week. Maryknoll moved up a spot to No. 2 in the latest ScoringLive/OC16 Girls Basketball Power Rankings, which were released Monday.

"I think that our program, over the 10 years or so just hasn't had the kind of caliber players where we could compete on a day-in, day-out basis with the top ILH teams and now we're getting there. We've got the kind of players that can step on the court and be competitive," Furtado said. "Last year we made a big step toward being competitive, but we lost to a bunch of these teams last year — a two-point loss to Kamehameha, a double-overtime game against Punahou. We've got to keep moving forward and now we've got to start winning these games."

The Spartans are a fairly balanced team anchored by a core group of five seniors and buoyed by some talented underclassmen.

"We don't have a so-called go-to person who can get us 18 points a game," Furtado said. "It's going to be 10 (points) here, nine there, 12 there and it's going to depend on who can step up depending on what our opponent tries to do to us."

Maryknoll averaged 57.9 points per game in its nine preseason victories, including a season-high 79 points against University High on Nov. 16, but proved that it can win the low-scoring type of game as well with Saturday's 35-33 win over reigning D1 state champion Kamehameha.

"It goes back to defense and we have to be solid on defense," Furtado said. "We have to get stops and keep the score down because we don't want to get into a run-and-gun type of game. We want to value each possession and if the game stays in the 30's, that's fine. We just need one more point than they do. I've always been an offensive guy, but I realize the value of solid defense and that's what we have to do."

Furtado said when he took over the program the first opponent his players had to get past was themselves.

"We wanted to use a couple years at the D2 level to situate ourselves and see where we're at," Furtado said. "We felt that D2 wasn't where we wanted to be, so we moved up. We have a nucleus of kids that could go up and compete and anytime you move up in caliber, you have to get the kids to believe that they're able to compete and the mental aspect is more important than the physical aspects of moving up."

The Spartans have responded well to the rigors of both the ILH D1 schedule and their demanding coach.

"I'm real happy with the development," Furtado said. "The kids are starting to buy in and focus on what they need to go as individuals to become better players and that in turn makes us a better team."

Still, Furtado knows that his team is a long ways from its ultimate goal of a third state championship — and first since back-to-back titles in the first two years of the girls' basketball state tournament in 1977 and 1978.

"It's nice to get off to a good start, but the girls understand that nobody is going to give us anything and that we will have to work for everything," Furtado said. "We're not taking anything for granted. Like I told the girls, these first two wins mean nothing if we drop one next week. We've got to be prepared and focused on the task at hand each day. That's what we're working torward. I like we we're at right now ... but ask me again in a couple weeks."

Maryknoll resumes its schedule Saturday with a road game at Sacred Hearts.