2008-09 Boys Varsity Basketball
Sunday, May 31st, 2009 The 2008-2009 Boys’ Varsity Basketball season has come to a close and now the time has come to reflect on our season. All of us knew that this season was going to be a rebuilding season after losing several seniors, both starters and bench players, from last season’s squad. We returned Patrick Reilly, a forth-year varsity player, and Matt Williams in his second year. The remainder of the roster however was untested in varsity basketball. Players like Cole Hennessy, Michael Reilly, and Beau Boyden all stepped up their play this year moving from junior varsity to varsity and all proved their worth.
This past season was meaningful for a variety of reasons. At one point in the beginning of the season it appeared that we would not have enough players to have competitive practices and be able to truly grow throughout the season. In the end, student-athletes like Noah Jenkins, David Avery, and Jacob Muller all decided to play for the first time in their careers and added another dimension to our team. Each was an Academic All-Northern, not to mention the fact that each brought a level of intensity and commitment to the program that I could never have expected for first-year players.
One of the pleasant surprises this season was Alex Ensby, a dynamic athlete who did not have a lot of experience in the sport but immediately made us a better team when he stepped on the court. Alex is a good example of the fact that it is never too late to take part in any activity in high school and have a real impact. Steve Sunderland was also a truly unique part of our season, having played the last two years on JV and this his first year on Varsity. Steve brought many aspects of his personality to our team and the guys really enjoyed his spirit throughout the season. The last full-time member of the Varsity is Tory Boyce. Tory was brought up midway through the season and served admirably as a staunch defender.
The 2008 season started off on a pretty tough note. In order to challenge ourselves and play a strong schedule we once again entered the Harrisville Central Tournament and played a tough game against eventual “D” West co-champs, the Harrisville Pirates in the first round. Although we would lose this game it led to a match-up that we would relish later in the season as well fell in the consolation game to the Hammond Red Devils. As league games got underway we saw loss after loss pile up yet I never noticed an attitude of hopelessness in the boys. I made it a point after every game to tell them that I believed in them and that eventually we were going to break through and that we were going to get better as the season went on. Our goal from day one was to end our season with at least one playoff victory and we never took our eyes off the prize.
After starting the season off 0-11 and seeing many improvements and close finishes, we finally got the end result we had been looking for with a big win at home against St. Regis Falls. We would go on to win 2 out of 3 and 3 out of our next 6 games leading up to a challenging stretch before the playoffs. Some of our best performances this season were not victories: a close loss at Madrid-Waddington before Christmas, a gritty performance against eventual section champion and state final four team Chateaugay, and of course our heartbreaking yet inspirational playoff game against Hammond in the first round of the sectional playoffs.
In our second game of the season Hammond proved to simply be too much for us, foiling every chance we had to score or break their press by forcing turnover after turnover. Hammond had been up on us as much as 30 points in this game and we knew it was a sign of how much we would have to work on throughout the season and improve. Some nineteen games later we would get our chance to show Hammond, our fans and supporters, and ourselves just how much we had improved throughout the season. The playoff game started off with two of our starters at less than one hundred percent with Patrick Reilly coming off of a bad sprained ankle and Alex Ensby with a case of the flu.
Once again these young men stood up to adversity and stared it right in the face. After a tough start in the first half we found ourselves down 7 points going into the last two quarters of our season. True to form we battled back once again and the ball found itself in senior captain Patrick Reilly’s hands with just seconds to go down 3 points. Patrick pulled up at half court and launched the most amazing shot I have witnessed as a coach as it “swished” through the net to tie the game with just seconds left forcing overtime. We would go on to lose that game 57-53 in overtime but you would never know it by looking at the smiles on our faces. We ended up falling short of our preseason goal but we fought as hard as any team in Section X and played with as much class as any other to truly make myself and the community extremely proud.
Thanks for a great season guys
Coach Bogart
Varsity Roster
Patrick Reilly (Captain; First Team All Northern)
Alex Ensby
Matthew Williams
Noah Jenkins
David Avery
Cole Hennessy
Michael Reilly (Section X Sportsmanship Award)
Beau Boyden
Steve Sunderland
Jacob Muller
Tory Boyce
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JV Call-Ups
Mark Avery
Alex Bonno
Daniel Knight
Michael Murray
Kiel Skelly
