CJ 1 wins show programs have come a long way
By: Rudy Brandl
Manville High’s basketball teams weren’t just happy to be there.
Athletic teams that reach a certain level of achievement often suffer from that dreaded feeling of satisfaction that prevents further growth. Neither the MHS girls nor boys fell into this category last week.
Both Manville teams were making their first state playoff appearance in a very long time. The girls, who hadn’t been there in 10 years, routed Dunellen in a preliminary game before losing at No. 1 seed Highland Park in the Central Jersey Group 1 quarterfinals. The boys, playing a CJ 1 game for the first time since 1988, scored a quarterfinal comeback win at Perth Amboy Vo-Tech before being eliminated by second-ranked Middlesex in the sectional semifinals.
Neither Manville basketball team had played a game since the Feb. 15 regular-season finale vs. North Plainfield. The Lady Mustangs showed some early rust after their 12-day layoff but dominated the second half and spanked Dunellen. The MHS boys also started slowly after not playing a game for two weeks but bounced back and defeated PAVT.
While both MHS hoop teams finished the season at 12-12, the similarities end there. The two squads achieved their success in different ways and continued to do so in the playoffs.
For starters, the boys use five seniors. There’s not a single upperclassman on the girls’ roster.
The boys are led by a rookie head coach in Bill O’Hea, who was the assistant last winter. Veteran Paul Lenihan, who has coached both the boys and girls twice since in the past 30 years, may have done his best work with the girls this season.
Three-point shooting and a fast-paced offense make the boys fun to watch. The girls don’t have many shooters, so they rely on scrappy defense and a disciplined offense.
Brad Costello is a legitimate star player for the boys. The 6-4 Costello dominated last Thursday’s game vs. Perth Amboy Vo-Tech with 20 points and 16 rebounds. Costello has tremendous statistics as the team’s leader in points and rebounds.
The girls have no such superstar. Instead, the Lady Mustangs are a gritty group of feisty players who scramble around and find a way to win. They won last week’s first playoff game despite shooting 22 percent from the field. That says an awful lot about their defense, which hounded Dunellen into 36 turnovers, an average of more than one per minute.
"We’re going to go down fighting every game," Lenihan said after the first-round win over Dunellen, which was played in front of a packed house in Manville.
The Lady Mustangs did go down fighting at Highland Park. They cut the lead to 23-19 late in the third quarter but couldn’t maintain enough offense to come all the way back. Highland Park won the game by 10 points.
An underdog as the eighth seed this winter, Manville could be a tournament favorite as soon as next year. Lenihan’s entire varsity roster is eligible to return, so the future is very bright for a group that shares a special chemistry.
"These kids show up every day and play hard at practice," Lenihan said. "That’s how we’re able to be successful. We have a real nice rotation."
"We’ve been playing together for a long time," sophomore guard Heather Mathieu added. "We’re all going to the same camp in the summer and we’re going to stay together and keep playing as long as we can."
Mathieu, fellow sophomores Renee Giraldi and Amy Ortman and juniors Kristin Shubiak and Rachel Rivera will all be a year older, stronger and more mature when the 2001-02 season begins.
The girls will have a few more chances to taste victory in the state tournament, a feeling the senior boys thoroughly enjoyed last Thursday afternoon.
"This is great," Costello said. "I’ve been waiting for this my whole high school career."
Although Costello and the Mustangs won, it certainly wasn’t pretty. The home team raced to a 17-5 lead and it looked like Manville’s dream of winning a playoff game would die quickly.
Costello and fellow senior Gregg Snyder got hot late in the second quarter and early in the third to covert a nine-point deficit into a four-point lead. Snyder hit a 3-pointer and two jumpers and Costello banked in two short hoops to ignite the surge.
PAVT rallied late in the third quarter and took a one-point lead into the fourth, but Manville scored 13 points in the first 2:10 of the period to take control. Snyder, who had four threes and 18 points, nailed two more bombs from the left side and Costello tossed in another.
"We’ve been waiting for this a long time," Snyder said. "A lot of us have been playing together since seventh and eighth grade. A lot of people said we couldn’t do this. I think we proved something today."