WAYNESWORD on HOOP, JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2010
*CDYBL & CYO Memories…
*ROCKIN’ WITH THE BEST IN THE BIG 10…
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Tribute to CDYBL Stars Past— 2006 Class, Now Seniors…
It goes by fast, my friends—even though the individual trips to various gyms all over the Capital District during the developmental years can seem sometimes tedious during the aptly named “Travel Leagues” and the CYO Leagues and all the chasing around during AAU
competitions and even back further to the Rec Leagues and Jr. NBA games on early Saturday mornings…standing back and looking at it all now, the whole thing goes by fast. Miles’s senior season of Varsity hoop competition is more than half over as I write this quick piece, and I am feeling nostalgic on one hand about all the games we’ve witnessed over the last decade, but also proud of the level of competition he’s gone against over the past 10-11 years of organized play. Being that we are 35 miles distant from his chosen high school relative to where we live, the traveling has been regularly overwhelming for us on a daily and weekly and monthly basis, but it has all been worth it, and we are sensing the end of the road, so to speak, as he makes his applications to college and embarks on a different kind of Travel altogether.
It was a scant 4 years ago that our senior basketball players
were in 8th grade, playing Travel Ball in the Capital District Youth Basketball League, which is one of the coolest breeding grounds for hoop talent in the area, outside of spring and summer’s cauldron of AAU ball. There were 18 teams in the league, and the “Travel” referred to a cross-section of the Suburban and Big 10 Public Schools (as opposed to the Private Schools, who were mostly represented in CYO Leagues, though they hadn’t recruited their best players yet).The best team in the league was always Albany. Everybody else was playing for second place, and the competition to get to that position was fierce… but let me tell you who this ALBANY team featured—I think you’ll recognize some names—they were LOADED.
Now Taran Buie was not part of this squad—like Jordan Stevens before him, he had torn up the league as a 7th grader and had nothing left to prove there by ’05-’06—though interestingly he had not played up a year as Jordan had, but against his own age group, with devastating results. The previous year, our boys were doing really well against all comers, until they were slaughtered by Buie’s team 105-24 on their own court. That set their confidence back a bit, but with perspective comes the knowledge that 2 years later, as a freshman, Buie would be 6th man on his brother’s Section 2 AA Championship Team, and the year after that would be Section 2 Player of the Year as a precocious soph. (Reportedly now he is at a prep school in State College, Pennsylvania, trying get ready to follow in Talor Battle’s shoes at Penn State if he succeeds in getting his academics back on track, after basically abandoning his school year once hoop season ended during his junior year. But that is strictly an aside to this story.)
But here’s who they DID have on the Albany CDYBL team,
four seasons ago:
Raja Johnson – a 6’4” guard who looked 5 years older, now in prep school himself after playing as a soph on Bishop Maginn’s State Championship Team that beat Mount Vernon in 2008;
Shavar Fields—now a 6’6 center at Bishop Maginn
Trahsan Burrell— now a 6’6” wing at South Kent Prep in CT.
Jerel Scott— a 6’4 2-guard at Maginn with D-1 potential
John Scurry— a 6’5” strongman and baseline shooter for Maginn
Terence “Moo” Inman—perhaps the fastest athlete that age in the area
Chris Jeffers— now a powerful 6’4” shooting forward for Maginn
Dylan Tully—a key reserve for Maginn, sometimes dazzling passer
Matt Cavallo—a 3-point specialist off the bench for LaSalle this year
Owen Daniels—a key bench player for Albany High who would likely start in any other league but the Big 10.
Porter Moody—a reserve for Maginn, who would likely be athletic enough to start at most other schools in Section 2.
To think that our Saratoga school district 8th grade boys that year came with 13 points of that squad, after getting blown out by 80 the year before, was quite an accomplishment, in retrospect. We got dominated by the Albany team on the boards, but shot well enough from outside, and handled well enough against their press, to control the damage and hang with them a bit. Miles played point at the time, though he was giving up 6 or 7 inches when he turned around to cover Raja Johnson. His running mate at guard all those years was current Saratoga senior Anthony Luciano, then and now a deadly lefthanded shooter. Football star running back Tony DeLoatch gave us beef and toughness inside, as he provides for the Saratoga Varsity now. Brennan Haley was our center, and I’ve admired his progress over the years as his game has matured. Our 3-man at the time was Zach Zaloga, who scored well in those days, and has been a rugged linebacker for CBA’s football team these past couple of seasons, and is also on the basketball squad for the Brothers. Our bench players were guys like Zach Arpey
(a #1 tennis player at Saratoga High, and point guard on varsity), Shawn Sweeney (a key D-back on Saratoga’s successful Section 2 Champion Football team this past 2009 campaign), Ben Van Earden
(a proficient lacrosse player, who is a defensive specialist for Saratoga’s hoop team now). Max Macielak, who grew up in the Saratoga area before his family’s move to Loudonville, was a lefty forward off the bench back then who also started for Miles’s St. Gregory’s squad in CYO—he is now on the CBA team as well as Zaloga. Another strong man who could bruise inside was Max A’Hearn, one of the best linemen on Saratoga’s football team this past season. Nick Leone was a clever ballhandler who could nail 3’s and provided back-up at point guard.
Miles was a key starter on that Saratoga team that contended with East Greenbush that year for the #2 spot. Nick Keefe was their high scorer then, as he is at Columbia High now... a deadly shooter and a feisty player even when he was lot skinnier and shorter than now. But some of the other good players from that team have left (Rich Smith is starting at LaSalle now) or turned to other sports like lacrosse, like .
South Colonie had Mike Branche and Jordan Meeks and
Frankie Lombardo; North Colonie had Chris Hooks, Chris Bogdan,
Cory Carmelo, Robert Johnson (focused more on football now), and a tough defender named Davey Perez, now a star lacrosse player as well. Also there at the time was a quick, lithe guard named Keaton Woods, who would end up transferring to CCHS the next year, in the same class as Miles.
Niskayuna had Kameron Ritter, doing his second stint in 8th grade ball during the year when he first transferred to CBA, and also had Guy Waltman, a great leaper for a white boy, and a good shooter named Bennett Knowlton, who is now is school in mid-Massachusetts, last I knew. The Saratoga Travel boys split two games with that Niskayuna squad, winning a regular season game at our place, and losing a contentious battle at the Martin Luther King Tourney of that year up at Mont Pleasant. That was the Saratoga team’s only loss out of our first 15 games that season (though it was non-league), until we met Albany down at their place, at a funky old gym on Whitehall Road.
Clifton Park was always tough—but Matt Miner wasn’t in the league as he was playing up on frosh ball at that point. Danny Lee was on a CYO squad from Clifton Park which we beat two out of three times with our gutsy little Saint Gregory’s squad from Loudonville—a graduating class of 12 or 13 boys, also playing teams like LaSalle (with Mike Murray, Marquis Campbell, Nick Edgington, and Matty Cavallo) and CBA (which had Josh Dennis and Jack Reilly at the time). At the time Miles was playing against the best his age in CYO and CDYBL ball, sometimes with 3 or 4 games in a weekend.
But I digress—the Clifton Park (Shen)team back then featured 2 stellar kids who are not even playing hoop right now— Darryl Chan and Schwabe Banks.. Chan was a lethal left-handed guard who I once saw score 35 in a game against the Albany City Rocks A team that featured Taran Buie and a host of other talent…playing for a rival called the Clifton Park Vipers at the time. He had moved to Troy at some point and attended Lansingburgh for a bit, but I never heard much about him in a basketball sense after that—though he may be a great street ball player somewhere by now. Banks was a football star at Shen for the past two season and presumably has a college career ahead of him in that sport. The other player who stuck with hoop from that CDYBL squad of 05-06 for Clifton Park’s Travel team was Josh Koopman, now a sometime starter for their varsity. A phenomenal athlete named Ryan Wilkins had played both CYO and Travel for Clifton Park teams during that era (and was also part of City Rocks on the 12 and 13 year old teams Miles played with), but he has now chosen to focus on volleyball, at which I hear he is incredible.
Schenectady had Reece Jackson and Tony Lewis and a host of other talented athletes, but Reece himself is one of the few or only ones that has stayed in the program from that 8th grade Class of ’06.
We beat them early that year, and this was before the Millinghaus contingent had moved up from NYC, but they beat Albany in the last game of the regular season, amazingly enough, which gave us both one loss and technically a co-championship with the powerhouse Albany squad of that year.
Scotia featured a coach’s son named Connor Shapiro who always did well against us in those days, while Burnt Hills was led by a kid named Matt Bynum (also a volleyball specialist now?) and a left-handed shooting guard named Zach Morton who since grew into a 6’6” beast of the boards who is dominating inside play in the Suburban Council this year. We had four years of interesting comp against both of those teams.
Amsterdam had two good guards who are still playing for them—Cory Sumpter and Jon Velasquez, and a couple of bigger kids
named Tony Sobkowich and Dan Mathias who also stuck with the program up to their senior year as well. Averill Park and Mohonasen really had the weakest teams in the CDYBL back then, but have pulled in some players that make them competitive on the varsity level since then. Bethlehem had Julian Wukitsch, a rugged lefty whose father and uncle were storied players at Mohonasen when I was playing, but I haven’t seen his name in the box scores for BC this season, and I don’t recognize most of the other names on their roster from those CDYBL scorebooks I have kept. Dan Kryzkowski was a decent player back in middle school for Bethlehem, and I had coached his dad in Little League back in the day, but maybe he is a baseball specialist now too, I don’t know.
Ballston Spa always gave us a good rivalry in those days, though their fortunes have faded of late in hoop, while they remain a powerhouse in football. Their feisty 5’9 quarterback Mark Seager was a great competitor in both sports—a good ballhandler, 3-pt. shooter, and floor general on the court as he was as a leader on the gridiron. Back in Travel ball, he had Nick Stassola alongside as a guard, and some serious strength upfront in Dom Denofio and Matt Clark. B. Spa also featured a wing scorer named Cullen Overholt who chose to transfer to private school (Loudonville Christian) like my son, although he is piling up points on the D level, frankly, instead of the considerably more challenging AA division of high school hoop. Only Denofio is still active on varsity with Seager in the Ballston Spa system, along with a kid named Josh Fabian from that class of eighth-graders in CDYBL ball four years back. I recall tough battles each year with that group, though Saratoga usually came out on top, our neighbors down the road were a combative and skilled bunch. As the years fade into the rearview mirror, those games that seemed overly aggressive and hard-fought are looked back on fondly.
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Epilogue:
I got a glimpse of that recently as Miles Perras played what will likely be his last academic game against Amsterdam High at their place in January of this, his senior year. He and Jon Velasquez have gone against each other with a passion since fifth grade—two tough kids who could each be stellar Streetball-type players in their own right—scoring on each other, wrestling the ball away from each other, throwing elbows and boxing out with a vengeance, playing nasty if not vicious defense on each other for years. Now with Catholic Central and formerly with Saratoga’s Travel team, and with some AAU bouts in between, they were not, shall we say, the friendliest of competitors, but always seemed to be matched up with each other. To my mind, Miles almost always got the better of the match-ups, but Velasquez had some amazing moments and hit some wild shots along the way—then it comes to the second and final go-around of their home-and-home series between their two Big 10 team, and Amsterdam seemed primed to gain revenge on their court for an early season loss on ours. Velasquez came out smoking, and hit the first two hoops of the game, bang-bang. One was a nice baseline slide for a gliding lay-up. The next was a stepback pull-up jumper from 16 feet straightaway that dropped through and barely hit the net. He looked like he would have a great game against us. Then Miles got out on a breakaway, the kind of easy hoop he hasn’t really had all year…Keaton Woods fires it ahead and Miles goes up high to score and Velasquez closes in fast, not wanting to concede the easy hoop—they collide violently and Miles gets the foul call, gets up and goes to the line, but Jon is writhing on the baseline in pain, howling and holding his ankle or knee, hard to tell which. The game is barely three minutes old and he is done, hobbling off to the bench with an ice-pack brought over to him by the trainer. Cory Sumpter comes in for him, and a junior named Antonio Johnson starts hitting like crazy and the two Big 10 teams have one of those shootouts in the first half you don’t see much in other leagues—fast-paced and it’s 45-42 at the end of the first HALF, with the home crowd screaming in joy as Sumpter hits
a beautiful three to punctuate their comeback from an early deficit.
Velasquez set the tone but never gets back in. His team plays some of his best ball of the season and has a late lead by four with under a minute left, but Sam Clement takes a rebound down the court for a full-length score, and next possession Miles shuts down Antonio, who had hit 24 points up to then, forces a turnover on an errant pass when no shot is possible, and then drills a pass to Keaton for a rising layup and it’s tied. They inbound, and without Velasquez to handle another steals is created by our press and Miles snags the ball and spins for another layup to put us ahead with scant seconds left.
At the end off a missed free throw by a teammate Miles ends up getting fouled and hits two more from the line to clinch a 4 point win, but it has not been easy. Their home crowd is deflated and shuffles out and I’m not sure how many people notice what happens next. When the teams engage in their usually-cursory handshake exchange, Keaton and Miles are last in line, and Keaton—who had played AAU ball with Velasquez as well-- goes over to shake his hand as he sits at the end of the Amsterdam, understandably glum. Then Miles follows and Jon pushes himself to his feet and they give each other a soul hug and slap each other on the back. It is reminiscent of two boxers who have pounded each other for fifteen rounds (or in this case, seven years) and have gained ultimate respect for each other over the course of the battle.
I loved seeing that moment, as it says a lot about the enduring legacy of high school sports, and the youth leagues that preceded the finale of varsity competition. It also signalled that the end of it all was nearing, and that was a bit poignant too.
Running The Gauntlet of the Big 10
Last year about this time I wrote a similar story, equally true, about the kind of competition my son was and has been up against in this league. I still contend that he has played face to face and chest to chest with the best players in Section 2, both last year and this year, and that anyone who doesn’t believe that the Big 10 is about 10 notches higher in athletic ability, strength, length, depth, and overall basketball skills than any other league within 50 miles of the Capital District just doesn’t know what they’re talking about.
Miles has matched up with Kam Ritter and Gilal Cancer of
CBA; Jerel Scott of Bishop Maginn; Derrick & Shadell Millinghaus of Schenectady; Marquis Campbell of LaSalle; James Vice of Bishop Gibbons; Velasquez and Sumpter of Amsterdam; Jakei Turman, Jahmeer Rollin, & Trahmier Burrell of Albany High; Raheem Felder, Greg Williams, John Pompey of Troy High; Salaam Knight and Sajae Pryor of Lansingburgh in an early Tournament game, plus Matt Miner and Jose Reyes of Shen in a January scrimmage. That’s a cross-section of the best combo and 2-guards in the area. Miles also had to cover Davonne Dunlap of Kingston in an early season game, who is likely higher ranked than any of the above. Last year he faced T. Buie (of Maginn) and Brian Hamor (Bishop Gibbons) and Ben Miseikis (of Amsterdam, who hit 37 against Troy but only 4 one night against us), Bunduka Kargbo (a bruiser from Maginn) and Jamel Fields and Tyler Foster and Nolan Hart (all of Albany Academy), plus underrated talents like Mason Horne (LaSalle), Corey Harris (of Albany High), Paul Ashburn and Steve Seebold (of Troy High), plus Ritter and Cancer and Josh Dennis of CBA, the latter of whom are all back for another round. Given this list, and the fact that he was often covering 20 pt. scorer Jordan Gettings in practice two years ago as a soph on varsity, tell me if any other 6’ white guard in the area has had tougher match-ups than that, and tell me how many of those offensive stars other than Miner he would’ve faced if he’d stayed in the Suburban Council at Saratoga Springs High School?
Did he shut all these guys down? No, of course not— Buie and Hamor and Millinghaus were guys who could score against anyone at will, and Dunlap and Fields and Ritter and Scott as well… but they often racked up points on steals and breakaways or against a leaky zone defense that were a lot easier to come by than when Miles was playing man-to-man on them. All I am saying here is that I am proud that my kid has been unafraid of competing against the BEST in the area, and was usually the one entrusted by the coach—last year and this—to do so. I know he fights through picks like Bruce Bowen used to, and confronts 3-pt shooters, and surprises guys with great handles by stopping their progress with a splatt—getting his hand on the ball down low-- now and then. I know he caught James Vice from behind on a breakaway this season at Gibbons and blocked his shot off the board, shutting up their raucous crowd for half a second. I know he had two hands on TOP of a certain prominent player’s shot in the lane in a recent game (though he drew a bogus foul on that stop), and it wasn’t till he went out of the game with foul trouble that CBA ran away with that game at our place.
I know that everyone looks at points in the boxscore, and
thrills to the ball going through the net, but that there is a lot more to the game than that—the good teams have unselfishness, and adept ballhandlers, and fundamental passing, and most of all tenacious D, to keep them in the games with the great teams. The CCHS record may not show it, but fans of the team this year know that they have been in many hotly contested games right up until the end, and the other teams at the top have known they were in for a battle. That’s all I’m saying.
To see Miles and his teammates play against the best athletes in Section 2 (not just the BEST hoopers, but the Best ATHLETES) has been worth the four year’s worth of driving we’ve done to get him to this Big 10 school. How it all turns out remains to be seen as I write this.
The end of the regular season is behind us and the AA Sectionals are approaching as I send this off to my webmaster to post. Frankly I’ve been reluctant to say too much about the current season while it was still underway, but I will likely be able to give a lively recap once it is truly over and the Sectionals are upon us. Catholic Central has played valiantly against the top comp in the area on a weekly basis, and their overall record is not good, but no one but CBA has blown us out (though we were tied at halftime, which I don’t think anyone else has managed), and almost every game has been a thriller one way or the other. Miles has gotten write-ups on occasion in the Troy Record recently (Wed. Feb. 3rd) when he hit a big late 3 to put us ahead of LaSalle (and then Kevin Wilkes followed with an inside three-point play to seal the win)-- and the Times Union, when he scored those game-winning points against Amsterdam on their court in mid-January. For a while our school was failing to call in results on all the home games (CCHS lost to Schenectady in an overtime thriller at home, 73-69, back when the Millinghaus boys were still on the team); and we beat Bishop Gibbons by about 6 at home, but neither game made the Times-Union or the other local papers—CCHS had one more win and loss in the league than had been posted, as of Feb. 9th…). In addition, the score of the Kingston game early in the season, in our own Tournament, was mis-reported so it looked like a 12 point loss when it was only 6, and was a 2 point game with 30 seconds left. There are always mistakes on the T-U page in terms of scoring and three-point shots and foul shots, but I got tired of fighting that battle, and it’s usually the home team’s fault, not the newspaper reporter’s…) The T-U website also still shows the CCHS coaching staff from 2 years ago, as opposed to the current staff of Head Coach Rich Foglia, and Assistant Anthony Pizzo. JV Assistant Nick Dooley has also worked hard with the team in practices and sits on the bench during games, along with Coach Barker, who has provided great moral support.
Having said that, I am looking forward to the Sectionals,
and will write more about the local hoop scene in a very candid way once we get to that point. Take care, and see you at a game soon…
Wayne Perras, February 2010