Twenty Years Ago Today…

Five Years Of Dedication Rewarded In Game Against Spotswood

SOUTH PLAINFIELD, NJ–Twenty years ago today was the basketball highlight of my life. On January 15, 1988, South Plainfield squared off against Spotswood in a crossover game that pitted a White Division school in SPHS against Spotswood, which was in the Gold Division at the time. In a contest that saw South Plainfield ultimately win by a score of 81-59, I got into my first game that year, and scored four points in the final minute of play much to the delight of the hometown fans. Now, it is a funny video to watch (my name is pronounced May-chose by the way!). As a matter of fact, I get a big kick out of it every time I see it. I always seem to pick up something new in the video, which I hadn’t watched in a very long time. Believe it or not, I thought that I had lost the video tape. However, I few months back, I began searching for it in anticipation of the twenty year anniversary, and found it in a closet with other videos.

Background

Let’s face it everyone, I wasn’t a good player by the time I was a senior in high school. So, to all the Burwells, Millers, Vince Rosarios, and Corey Franciscos of the world, your scoring marks would be safe. I had potential when I was a freshman, but it was only my second year in organized basketball, and frankly, I wasn’t ready to play in close games. I was too nervous. My first year of basketball on any level was at South Plainfield Middle School in Eighth Grade. The team that I played on was coached by long time Middle School coach, Terry Allen, who retired a few years ago. Mr. Allen was also my 6th Grade math teacher, and president of the SPEA. As a matter of fact, he presented me with a scholarship at the end of my senior year a couple weeks before graduation. In 1983-84, the SPMS boys basketball team was 17-4 overall on the year with all four losses coming at the hands of two teams: Somerville and Highland Park. We actually beat Somerville twice as well. Our team won the 1984 Dunellen March of Times Tournament by defeating Readington of Hunterdon County by a score of 44-39 in the Championship at what is now the Mike Shello Gymnasium in Dunellen High School.

However, by 9th Grade many of the key players on that 8th Grade team were no longer on the roster. Dave Koenig attended St. Joseph’s in the fall of that year, and ended up playing three years of basketball there as well as being a baseball standout. Koenig went on to attend the University of Scranton, and is doing fine these days working with autistic children somewhere in Morris County. Tommy Weimer and his family moved to Ohio. Lamar Hall, who went on to be a standout football player at SPHS by my senior year, was academically ineligible. Consequently, we were 5-14 on the season. Guys like myself, who were used to coming into games with 15, 20, and 25 point leads as eighth graders, weren’t quite ready to play in the close ones. If I had been as mentally ready as I was my senior year, I would have been a better player not only that year, but probably in my entire career. Another thing that hurt as well was the fact that boys basketball at SPHS was in a period of transition. During the first three years in high school, there were three different varsity coaches: Willie Leonardi, who also served as the Athletic Director, Norm Mopsick, who I believe had two daughters that grew to be standout players at Manalapan a few years back, and then Jeff Lubreski. Leonardi actually went on to coach at Scotch Plains-Fanwood and Voorhees, and also had coached at the college ranks at places such as Moravian.

While there were several coaching changes during my four year tenure at the school, one thing was constant my first three years, and that was Joe Thompson. For those of you, who may not be aware, Thompson, who scored 1,314 in his four years at SPHS, was the all time leading scorer at SPHS before Marquis Jones broke the mark back in the 2004-05 season. Thompson was a competitor, who didn’t back down from anyone, and I was witness to it on several occasions my sophomore year, which was his senior year. One instance in particular was in January, 1986 in a game against Perth Amboy. This was the Perth Amboy team that reached the GMCT Semifinals before losing to New Brunswick, and was led by Andre Heard and William Pennyfeather, who played minor league baseball for the Pittsburgh Pirates, and recently was on the Newark Bears if I’m not mistaken. Well, in this game, Amboy was leading by about ten in the late third, or early fourth quarter when South Plainfield, which ran a deliberate offense the whole game, rallied to pull within one late. With a chance to win, South Plainfield had the ball in the closing seconds, and got it to senior guard John Thievon for a shot from the left wing that he missed. In the fight for the rebound, Thompson and Heard locked horns, and moments later, a brawl ensued. The fight was broken up, and Amboy escaped with a 48-47 win. Thompson would become the school’s all time scorer on February 22, 1986 on the road against St. Mary’s of South Amboy, which we all know today as Cardinal McCarrick. He surpassed the previous record holder, Wally Cirafesi (1,304 points) in a basket in the first quarter.

Following the 1985-86 season, Thompson graduated as well as the likes of Thievon, Jeff Missimer, Ryan Jones, John Kudrick, and Jeff Cantamessa. Add to that the losses to graduation the previous June of Chris Smith, Shawn Cisson, and Malcolm Hammond, and Tiger basketball was looking to rebuild. During the summer of 1986, South Plainfield Basketball would hit a low point in the Old Bridge Summer League run by the late Len Sepanak, who was the coach at Cedar Ridge at the time. In a game against Piscataway, which was still a member of the Mid-State Conference at the time, the woeful Tigers couldn’t break double digits. The Chiefs routed their neighborhood rival, 68-9. A standout player on that Piscataway team at the time, Tyrone Brewer, who went on to play at what is now today The College of New Jersey with Greg Grant, recalled that P-Way legendary coach, Paul Schoeb actually told the team in a timeout that if they held SPHS under ten, he would buy them all sodas. By the way, I never confirmed that with Schoeb himself. To give you an idea of how bad things had gotten for our program at that point, I scored two points in this debacle on a layup underneath with about 20 seconds to go in the first half. It was the only time in my ill-fated basketball career that I had accounted for 20 percent or more of our offense in a game (22.2 percent). However, things would gradually begin to change when a 26 year old assistant coach from Immaculata arrived into town that summer.

The Lubreski Era Begins At SPHS

During the middle of that dreadful summer at the Old Bridge Summer League held at what was then Madison Central High School, Jeff Lubreski came in, and within a couple weeks had transformed a poorly organized team into a much more competitive one. Norm Mopsick, who coached South Plainfield through the inaugural season of the Greater Middlesex Conference, stepped down to take a teaching position closer to home in Howell. South Plainfield won its first round playoff game at the Old Bridge Summer League, which set the stage for a rematch with Piscataway. While the Chiefs would win again this time around, we certainly let them know that we weren’t going as quietly as we did a few weeks earlier. The final score was 46-24, and yes, I did score two points in that game too on a jumper from the right wing late in the game. While Lubreski had already made an impact, he still had plenty of work to do. That was because the following winter would be as bitter cold as the temperatures were outside. Lubreski’s inaugural campaign at SPHS was a difficult one to say the least. The Tigers started out 0-14. As a matter of fact, in his first three years at South Plainfield, Lubreski amassed a record of only 22-48. Breaking that down by season, it went: 4-18 in 1986-87, 11-13 in 1987-88, and 7-17 in 1988-89. After losing nine straight, Dr. Leroy Seitz, the principal at the time, who eventually became Superintendent in the Woodbridge School system for a while, arranged for a pep rally the day of the Perth Amboy game. Well, what might have been in good intentions, didn’t work, SPHS trailed Ray Stewart led Amboy 45-14 at the half, and while making things much more respectable in the second half, lost 77-61.

The team, which had some notable players such as Joe Ranno, Lance Brown, and even Jimmy Kohl, who would go on to pitch at Rutgers, and even have a minor league career with the Mets and Twins, would finally break through on a Friday night late in the season by defeating Madison Central. Capping things off, Joel Endick, who went on to be the manager for the Rutgers Football team during the Doug Graber era, scored four points in the final minutes as the crowd went wild by banging on the bleachers. This part of the story is very important for what I will tell you later. South Plainfield would split four of its final eight games that year including victories over St. Mary’s of South Amboy, Sayreville, and Bishop Ahr. Trying to build a foundation for a program at South Plainfield, Lubreski got the team into the very competitive Westfield Summer League with the likes of St. Peter’s, St. Joseph’s, Westfield, Scotch Plains, and West Windsor South among others. On top of that, the team also played in a summer league against Adult League teams in South Plainfield at either the High School or the PAL, and went to a camp at what is now The College of New Jersey. In the fall, there was open gym like always. Going into this year, I had played JV in both my sophomore and junior seasons. So this was my last shot at varsity, or playing any kind of organized basketball. I went to the summer leagues religiously, but unfortunately, didn’t have the money to go to camp.

The 1987-88 Season

Not playing much during the summer leagues, and with the program going with sophomores such as Jimmy Smith and Joey Campagna as well as newcomers such as John Tupponce, I wasn’t exactly surprised that I got cut the week after Thanksgiving. I was disappointed though at the time since I wanted to at least play one year of varsity ball, wear the school uniform, and get a varsity letter at the end of the season. Fortunately, I would get another chance although it didn’t sound appealing at first. What happened was that a couple kids on the freshmen team quit, and two freshmen on the JV squad, Quinn Johnson and Corey Czech, the son of former Athletic Director, Al Czech, had to practice with the freshmen. Consequently, players were needed to practice with the JV. Johnny Oranchak and I were the guinea pigs. Let’s put it this way, if it weren’t for Oranchak, there might not only been no varsity ball for me, but also no GMC Hoops! While Oranchak was willing to take the deal without any hesitation, I had deliberated on the deal. I thought about it so much that I was up until 3:00 AM on that fateful Friday morning. It was December 4, 1987.

Coming in late to school that day, I had still not made up my mind. It wouldn’t be made up until right after school when I sat down with Coach Lubreski. After some discussion, I decided to go to practice. I was going to at least play my senior year. Make no bones about it though, it wasn’t easy. First of all, I started the year practicing with the JV. However, about a week after I began practicing again, I was thrown into a full court scrimmage between the first and second string varsity squads. In that scrimmage, I had proven my worth. From that practice on, I practiced with the varsity. Playing time would be an entirely different matter though. Even in lopsided losses, I didn’t get in the game. I guess you could say I was what you hear politicians often say, “The Nuclear Option!” On opening day, Lubreski handed out copies of John Haley’s Top 20 back when he was writing for the News Tribune years before his father’s death and the merger with The Home News. In that pre-season Top 25, Colonia and South River were ranked, and those two teams would be our first two opponents of the 1987-88 campaign. Opening night, we traveled up to Colonia High School, which has not been kind to Tiger hoops over the years despite the successes of the teams from the Marquis Jones and Darren Smith era.

Entering that opening night contest, the Patriots, then coached by the legendary Bob Tisdale, who passed away back in March 2006 the day Colonia lost to Newark Westside in the North Jersey Section 2 Group III semifinals, had won 56 straight games at home led by the likes of 1,000 point scorer Gary Battle and Fred Herzog. However, they had graduated, Bob Timinski was still at St. Joseph’s, and the Pats were a rebuilding team. Although Colonia would go up 12-4 in the first quarter, South Plainfield regrouped, and eventually came out on top, 60-50. The following game, we defeated South River, which had a freshman by the name of Deon Jackson, the nephew of Penn State football great, and Philadelphia Eagle wide receiver, Kenny Jackson. Deon Jackson would go on to become the school’s all time leading scorer with 2,332 points by the time he graduated in 1991.

Led by senior Billy Cochrane and junior Pete Leonardis, we won two more games after that to not only start the year 4-0, but also win the 1987 Bound Brook Crusader Classic, and was ranked tenth in the Middlesex County Top Ten in the Star-Ledger. However, the team didn’t keep the momentum going losing 13 of its last 20 games to finish 11-13, but it was still good enough to qualify for both the Central Jersey Group II Tournament, and the GMC Tournament, which was still only a 16 team field back then. It didn’t become an open tournament until the 1993-94 season. The Tigers would lost to top ranked St. Peter’s in the first round of the GMCT held at Middlesex County College. Led by the likes of Mike Doctor, and coached by Wayne Fiorino, the Cardinals, the only top seeded team to reach that year’s Final Four, jumped out to a 39-26 halftime lead, and led by as much as 58-38 in the second half before ultimately winning, 76-65. In the first round of the CJ Group II Tourney, South Plainfield, the eleventh seed defeated sixth seeded Piscataway Tech by a score of 67-66 on a last second shot by junior Kazzie Taylor, who was academically ineligible his sophomore year, but practiced that entire season with the JV. He ended up being one of the team co-captains.

What They Were Doing Then…

Below you will see some of key figures in not only GMC Boys Basketball history, but also at South Plainfield, and in the Greater Middlesex Conference altogether as they were then and now.

Person	Doing Then	Doing Now
Jeff Lubreski	Head Coach–South Plainfield–2nd season	Retired from coaching. Son plays basketball at Blair Academy
Gene Mosley	JV/Assistant Coach–South Plainfield–2nd season	Principal–Dunellen High School
Frank Noppenberger	Head Coach–East Brunswick–won 1987 GMCT	AD–East Brunswick
Bill Schulte	Head Coach–SPHS Girls Basketball Team	Head Coach–SPHS Boys Basketball Team
Mike Buggey	Head Coach–SPHS Wrestling Team	AD–South Plainfield
Bo Henning	Head Coach–J.F. Kennedy	Head Coach–East Brunswick
Tom Carpenter	Head Coach–South Brunswick	Head Coach–Toms River East
Lenny Reyes	Sophomore at J.F. Kennedy	JV/Assistant Coach–J.P. Stevens
Dave Turco	Senior at Carteret	Head Coach–St. Joseph’s
Marquis Jones	A week shy of turning 9 months old	Playing at University of Rhode Island
Darren Smith	A ten days shy of 1st birthday	Playing at University of Pennsylvania
Greg Machos	Senior at SPHS	GMC Hoops

The Spotswood Game–January 15, 1988

After starting the season at 4-0, South Plainfield began to come back down to earth with a blowout loss on the road at J.F. Kennedy (71-48), a loss in overtime at South Brunswick (65-58), and a disappointing defeat to Bishop Ahr (65-61), the Tigers entered the game against Spotswood needing a victory to stay above .500, and give it a fighting chance to get into the state tournament. Spotswood was still fighting somewhat for respectability just as much as South Plainfield was at that time. The Chargers, which now compete in the Blue Division, back then competed in the GMC Gold. Here is roughly how the divisions were shaped back then.

GMC Red Division

• East Brunswick
• Edison
• J.P. Stevens
• Madison Central
• Perth Amboy
• Sayreville
• St. Joseph’s
• Woodbridge

GMC White Division

• Bishop Ahr
• Cedar Ridge
• Colonia
• J.F. Kennedy
• North Brunswick
• South Brunswick
• South Plainfield

GMC Blue Division

• Carteret
• Highland Park
• Metuchen
• Monroe
• South River
• St. Peter’s

GMC Gold Division

• Hoffman*
• East Brunswick Tech
• New Brunswick Tech
• Perth Amboy Tech
• Piscataway Tech
• Spotswood
• St. Mary’s
• St. Pius

South Plainfield got off to a fast start, and never really looked back. Prior to the game, my friends and teammates felt pretty certain that I was going to get in. I had not played a minute of varsity ball up to this point in the season. By the second half, it was apparent that I was going to get into this game. We were comfortably ahead, and the reserves were already seeing considerable playing time by the fourth quarter. The question was, when was I going to get in? That question was answered at about the 5:00 mark when I came in for Leonardis, who had just finished up going one of two at the foul line. To be honest, I should have scored at least eight points in this game. Although I could have gotten more chances (Kazzie Taylor took advantage of the garbage time with some jumpers to pad his scoring on the night), I saw in this tape that I could have gotten two other baskets, but didn’t follow through on the step I had on my defender. Eventually though, as you will see below, I did break through, and National Guard Troops were almost put on alert!

The box score in the News Tribune showed that I had four points on two field goals. Actually, I was 2 of 3 from the floor for my 4 points with 2 steals, a block, and a foul. Most importantly, though, what I had learned that season from persistence, dedication, and determination, were things that would last me a lifetime. A couple years after school ended, I went through some tough times dealing with anxiety and depression. However, my persistence helped me overcome those problems for the most part, and kept me continuing toward getting not only my Associates Degree in Computer Science from Middlesex County College, but also my Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science from Rutgers last May. It also has helped me a great deal in building up this site. In addition to reading all the great stuff in the News Tribune back in my high school days thanks to not only John Haley, but his brother Rich, my dedication to high school hoops, and my persistence to head out to games during the late spring, summer, and fall in addition to those days during the season like the holiday tournaments, where I’ll see up to seven in one day, was built during this season. The lesson here is that some of us may not be talented or gifted enough to play basketball in the NBA, but we can still get enough out of playing the sport, or other sports in high school to learn things that help us in real life.