VIDALIA — Former Vidalia High School basketball player Gary Stewart is spending some time relaxing for the summer.

But despite that, he’s not taking any time off from basketball.

Stewart, who will be entering his sophomore season at Northwestern State University, said he’s taking it easy and spending time with friends before he returns to campus for the fall.

“I still go to (Vidalia High School) from time to time, and me and my former teammates still call each other to play ball,” Stewart said. “We’ll join in when they have summer practices at the high school.”

Stewart averaged 4.4 points per game for the Devils last season and only played an average of 13.2 minutes per game. He said a groin injury hampered him during the season.

“At the beginning (of the season), I was mostly a full-time player, then I pulled my groin,” Stewart said. “I sat out a couple of games and had to get myself back in the rotation. When my confidence came back around, I went back to playing full-time.”

Stewart admitted that he initially didn’t take the groin injury as seriously as he should have.

“At first, I didn’t thing the injury was that serious, but when I tried to practice the next day, I couldn’t move the way I wanted to,” Stewart said.

“I thought it would be gone in a week, but I really had to do a lot of recovery training with our trainer. It was almost three weeks before I could run again. It was kind of frustrating.”

But with a season under his belt, Stewart said he has high hopes for this year’s Devils squad.

“My main goal is to try to start every game, and be one of the most productive players on the team,” Stewart said. “Hopefully, we can get to the (NCAA) Tournament this year.”

And Stewart said he thinks that goal is reachable.

“I feel like we have an even better chance than last year,” Stewart said. “We lost our two main players (from last season’s team), but I feel like we’re more of a team this year and that we have more chemistry.”

Stewart said he still keeps in touch with all his former teammates at Vidalia, including Torrey Dixon, who currently plays for Baton Rouge Community College. When Dixon had a heart attack last April, Stewart said he found out about it from a teammate.

“I was sitting in my room watching TV, and one of my teammates came it and said that Torrey had a heart attack,” Stewart said. “My teammate’s high school coach is the coach (at BRCC), but at first I didn’t think it was the same Torrey.

“When I found out later that it was, I didn’t know what to think. No one told me if he had died, or if he was in surgery, or how bad it was. It was really scary for me.”

But Stewart said he was able to connect with Dixon after Dixon was released from the hospital.

“I had come home one weekend, and I was walking down the street, and I saw him drive by,” Stewart said. “He stopped and picked me up, and we started talking about school and about the situation before dropping me off at a friend’s house.”

Stewart said he’s set to return to Northwestern State by the end of July.