Most team members will be called to varsity next winter
By: Shawn Tyrrell
The 2000-01 boys’ basketball season at Manville High was successful in many ways.
Not only did the varsity team even score a major upset over North Plainfield and win a county tournament game, but the Mustangs also qualified for the state tournament and won a playoff game for the first time in 13 years.
With all the excitement surrounding the varsity squad, there was another group of players who had an extremely successful campaign. The junior varsity team enjoyed about as good a year as one could hope, posting a 15-2 mark and doing so with young group of kids.
Next year many of these players will be called upon to make the jump to the varsity level, as Manville will lose all five starters to graduation. The jayvee team’s two losses were by St. Mary’s and Newark Central and both came in the second half of the season.
What does a 15-2 jayvee mark mean?
It will do wonders for the MHS program. It proves that Manville can win on any level and the success of these younger kids bodes well for future varsity teams.
MHS jayvee coach Mike Brandstetter took over for a team that went 7-10 last season. He was surprised at the 15-2 mark, but not the Mustangs’ level of play.
"I feel that overall we had as much talent as any of the other teams that we played," Brandstetter said. "We also were very fortunate to have the depth that we did. It enabled us to be able to play a lot of people at a number of positions."
Although Brandstetter was in his first year at the helm of the boys jayvee, he is no stranger to Manville sports. He has been the soccer coach the past five years and also serves as Junior Varsity coach for baseball. The first year coach stepped right in and helped continue the education and growth that coach Bill O’Hea instituted last season. O’Hea gave Brandstetter nothing but praise.
"I give Mike a lot of credit," O’Hea said. "He helped bring the kids along and helped get the message out to the younger kids."
That message being that the players much work harder.
"We have a good group coming up," Brandstetter said. "But for them to improve they are going to have to work harder and give 100 percent all the time. If there was one thing that hurt us was that we weren’t always playing at 100 percent."
Even though the team had weaknesses there strength from start to finish was their familiarity and ability to run the offense.
"The kids ran the offense well without panicking," Brandstetter said. "Not many times this year did we get out of sync. If things started to get unraveled they would slow things down and run the plays the way they were taught."
Brandstetter experimented with different offensive and defensive schemes to enhance the learning experience of his jayvee troops. While this may have hurt the team a few times, it created more seasoned players in the long run.
The MHS boys lost their second meetings to Newark Central (56-46) at St. Mary’s of Elizabeth (54-48). Manville led Central but was outscored 29-12 in the fourth period. The Mustangs trailed the entire way in the loss to St. Mary’s.
In the first games vs. Central and St. Mary’s, Brandstetter went with a zone defense. But the second two times he used a man defense for most of the game. He wanted the players to see what it would be like to play man defense against quality teams that can run the floor. Brandstetter wanted to prepare them for the next level, where they will be expected to play man to man defense a lot more.
The players that made the jayvee season a huge success were freshman guards Eddie Gryzeski, Glenn Liszczak and Joey Pohl, sophomore guards Robert Snyder, Mark Maychrich and Brian Teryek and forwards Jimmy Thomaszfski, Ed Wass, Joe Adamchik, Kyle Galasso, Jon Pfoutz, Jon Gangwer and Mike Vagi. Junior players were Chris Hardgrove and John Carpenski.
These kids hold the key to the Mustangs’ future. How successful the future will be depends on how much work they are willing to do and the commitment they choose to make.