By Bob Nuse, The Packet Group
In their first season together in the Princeton Recreation Men’s Summer Basketball League, the Hillsborough High School graduates who formed Belle Mead Physical Therapy showed they still have some game.
The group of former Raiders got together in the competitive men’s league and finished third in the regular season, reaching the playoff semifinals before being eliminated last Friday night.
”We have all been playing together since fourth grade travel basketball,” said Matt Johnston, who played in the league last year but came back this year with his own team full of Hillsborough grads. “I knew this league was good competition so I emailed Evan (Moorhead, the league commissioner) and he told me he would let me know if they had room for another team and they did. So I told all of these guys and we were able to put the team together.”
BMPT finished the regular season with a 5-3 record and opened the playoffs with a 36-33 win over Princeton Interventional Cardiology before falling to King’s Pizzarama, 51-42, in the semifinals.
”We all play pick-up all the time together at Ann Van Park,” said Johnston, a 2013 HHS graduate who will be a sophomore at Rutgers University. “I just figured a bunch of guys are playing in college and they need something to do in the off-season. We knew the competition would be good and this has been a fun time for all of us.”
The team includes recent graduate Jalen Parham, who graduated in June, and the rest of the roster is made up of 2013 graduates. Parham finished with a team-high 10 points in the semifinal loss. In addition to Johnston and Parham, the rest of the roster this summer for BMPT included Jonathan Gregory, Nigel Herbert, Mike Pappalardo, Dan Reilly, Zack Metwally, Brandon Malebranche, Tyson Murdock, Ryan Rendinaro and Jordan Sobel.
”We have four or five guys who are going to be playing in college and some of the guys just like to play the game,” said Johnston, who is a student manager for the basketball team at Rutgers and would like to coach in the future. “We all like basketball and we all like playing together.
”We want to try to play next year. As long as we’re all together we’ll try to take advantage of it and keep playing.”
Parham was selected to the All-League second team, whole Johnston and Jonathan Gregory were named to the third team. Dan Reilly earned a spot on the league’s All-Underrated team.
”There are so many good teams in this league,” Johnston said. “One of my best friends (Nick Alaimo of Tortuga’s Mexican Village) plays for TCNJ so he plays with them in the summer. He didn’t think we’d do that well but we ended up beating them the first night by one point and I won’t let him forget that. I think one through five, at least, every team had a chance to go to the finals this year.”
Prior to the semifinals the league announced its All-League selections as well as other awards.
Chris Hatchell of Winberie’s was named the league’s regular season Most Valuable Player, while Anthony Gaffney of King’s Pizzarama was named the Newcomer of the Year. Shahid Abdul-Karim, who plays for Ivy Inn, was given the Ron Washington Award for service to the league and the community.
First team All-League selections were Hatchell and Terence Bailey of Winberie’s, Gaffney, Bobby Brackett of Mexican Village, and Davon Black of Northeast Realty. Named to the second team were Parham, Skye Ettin of Mexican Village, Juwan Harrison of Princeton Pi/Sketch Yogurt, Jay Frank of Winberie’s, and James Smith of Princeton Interventional Cardiology. The third team selections were Matt Johnson of King’s Pizzarama, Anthony Brown of Northeast Realty, Kevin Kane of Princeton Youth Sports, Johnston and Jonathan Gregory, both from Belle Mead Physical Therapy.
Ryan Johnson of King’s Pizzarama was one of five players named to the All-Underrated team, joining teammate Lou Conde, Reilly, and the Moore brothers, Tommy and Tad, from Princeton Youth Sports.