Boys Basketball – No. 15 Holmdel Knocks Off No. 2 Red Bank in CJ III First Round

Red Bank's Emotional Two-Year Ride Ends

LITTLE SILVER – Playing on a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee all season long, Holmdel senior Jeff Harris might have finally played more than his injured knee could handle, according to Holmdel head coach Sean Devaney – who said his senior captain could barely walk after the Hornets’ NJSIAA Central Jersey Group III first-round game at Red Bank Regional Wednesday night.

If Wednesday was the last game in Harris’ inspirational season, his teammates made sure his act of bravado did not go without a pay-off.

Seeded No. 15 in the section, Holmdel walked into the field house at Red Bank and took down the No. 2 Bucs, 63-58, thanks to 13 three-pointers and an inspired team effort on both ends of the court. Holmdel will have Thursday off before travelling Friday to play No. 10 Middletown North – which snapped a 10-game losing streak Wednesday by knocking off No. 7 Hopewell Valley on the road.

“At first, we thought this could really be a rough year when Jeff went down early,” senior Ray LaForte said. “Then he decided to try to play and eventually we started to play better, and we started to think, ‘Hey, why not us?’”

Four Holmdel players – Harris, LaForte, senior Luke Mayell, and freshman Kyle Cardaci – hit three 3-pointers apiece in the win. Mayell finished with a game-high 21 points and scored five crucial points early in the fourth quarter to squash a 12-0 Red Bank run that turned a 19-point Holmdel lead with three minutes left in the third quarter into a seven-point advantage.

“When we drive and kick and we hit our threes, we’re a dangerous seed,” Mayell said. “I don’t care if we’re a 15 seed. If we’re hitting our threes, I think we’re a pretty good team.”

LaForte, meanwhile, added 16 points and converted a pivotal three-point play with 1:45 left that put Holmdel ahead 54-43. The basket-plus-the-foul came in transition after Kyle Rooney blocked a driving attempt by Red Bank senior Tyler Christie that could have pulled the Bucs closer than they had been since early in the second quarter.

“I think our guys came in confident and when we were able to hit all of those threes in the first half, I think their confidence just grew from there,” Devaney said. “But we knew they (Red Bank) were going to come back. We knew were weren’t going to go up twelve early and win by thirty. We expected them to press the way they did and our guys were able to weather that storm, defend well in the half court and make a couple big plays on offense.”

“I saw that (three by Mayell) go in and all just thought, ‘We’ve got to keep coming. We can’t stop,’” Mayell said. “I’m just so proud of my guys that we were able to just keep playing and fight through it.”

Red Bank applied its full-court pressure for most of the game, but Holmdel was able to counter it early by working the ball up court to open shooters. The Hornets hit eight first-half threes on the way to a 31-19 halftime lead.

“We knew they were going to come at us with the press and a lot of teams do,” Devaney said. “Let’s face it, we shot a high percentage. It’s one thing to get (open shots) but it’s another thing to knock them down, and we did that early and our confidence grew from there.”

Mayell and LaForte helped close the game with big baskets, but Harris – as he has improbably done several times this season – pushed Holmdel out to a 42-23 lead by knocking down three shots from behind the arc, as well as one from inside of it. He hit two three-pointers as part of a 9-1 run that pushed the lead to 19.

“It’s a huge motivation,” Mayell said. “He’s playing with three torn ligaments in his knee and it just shows how much pride he has. You might be hurting, but he’s hurting and he’s not saying one word about it.”

Harris tore his ACL in October while playing in a fall league game and convinced a skeptical Devaney to let him remain an active member of the varsity roster while he learned to play with the injury. After earning a reputation as a knock-down three-point shooter with deep range and slashing ability as a sophomore and junior, Harris was able to turn in games of 19 and 22 points during the season.

“I didn’t want him playing this year, I’ll be the first to say,” Devaney said. “Not because I didn’t want him, but because I like him so much. I didn’t want to see him labor or get hurt again and laying on the floor.

“At first he got in the games and I just thought, ‘Well, this is not terrible,’ but he wasn’t able to find his stroke. Then, over the last three or four weeks, you can really see that he has his confidence and he’s got the flow back. He became a threat again.”

While his 11 points Wednesday did not approach either of those totals, they all came over the first three quarters and helped spark Holmdel to a lead that was too much for even a resilient Bucs squad to overcome.

“I told him after the game I’ve been watching him from afar all year I’m so utterly impressed,” Red Bank coach Scott Martin said of Harris. “I thought it was a courageous thing and a selfless thing to do. To sacrifice your well-being for the good of the team speaks volumes of the kid’s character.”

Unfortunately for Harris and the Hornets, his season is likely over, according to Devaney. Harris came out of the game early in the fourth quarter after, as Devaney described, his knee buckled.

“He’s a captain, he’s a three-year starter, I’d like to think he would have been a thousand-point scorer if he was healthy,” Devaney said. “He means everything to this team and whether or not it’s over for him, he’s gone above and beyond anything we could have expected and was able to contribute to a really great win here tonight.”

Box Score

Holmdel 63, Red Bank 58

Holmdel (63): Luke Mayell 6 6-10 21, Ray LaForte 4 5-7 16, Kyle Rooney 0 0-0 0, Matt McDonnell 0 1-2 1, Jeff Harris 4 0-0 11, Kyle Cardaci 3 0-0 9, John Miller 0 0-0 0, Kevin Ziznewski 0 2-2 2, Jeff Zhou 1 0-0 3. Totals: 18 14-21 63

Three-pointers: Mayell 3, LaForte 3, Harris 3, Cardaci 3, Zhou

Fouled Out: McDonnell

Red Bank (58): Jack Navitsky 0 0-0 0, Anthony Mitchell 2 1-2 6, Sadiq Palmer 5 6-11 16, Tyler Christie 5 4-6 15, Justin Gilson 1 2-4 5, Eddie Hendrex 5 1-2 11, Jimmy Ferrogine 1 1-2 3, Connor Kelly 1 0-0 2. Totals: 20 15-27 58

Three-pointers: Mitchell, Christie, Gilson

Fouled Out: Mitchell, Hendrex