Pierson Boys Basketball Takes Care of Center Moriches on Spirit Night

It was clear from the opening tip-off that the Pierson boys basketball team didn’t really need any additional motivation to defeat visiting Center Moriches as part of the nightcap of Spirit Night on Friday evening, but the jam-packed, standing-room only crowd certainly helped.

The Whalers jumped out to an early 10-1 lead, and with contributions from a number of different players, they held a 42-20 halftime lead over the Red Devils. Eventually, Pierson put a nice bow on the night with a solid 79-60 victory.

Although it wasn’t Senior Night for the boys — that’s February 1 against Port Jefferson — Spirit Night hearkens to that type of night because it’s memorable on so many levels. Each class of the high school, freshmen through seniors, create banners and their own sections in the high school stands. This year’s winners were the seniors, with the freshmen being runner ups.

Pierson’s two seniors, Logan Hartstein and Fritz Desir, certainly enjoyed and cherished the night.

“It’s nice having the whole school community come. We had all grades here, everyone was getting loud,” Hartstein said. “We came out with a lot of energy. We were able to bury them in the beginning, and that’s how we want to come out in every game.

“Just me being new to this school, coming in having so much school spirit, especially not being able to play the past two years really because of health problems, this really made me feel welcome,” Desir added.

Charlie McLean led Pierson with 22 points while Dom Mancino scored 13 and both Luke Seltzer and Aven Smith finished with 11 points. But, as previously mentioned, Pierson got contributions from just about everyone. Aidan Schmitz nailed a pair of three pointers that helped the Whalers stay out in front by a wide margin in the first half. And Lance Schroeder kept the home crowd pumped when he was fouled hard but still managed to score in the fourth quarter with many of the starters out.

Pierson head coach Will Fujita said he likes to attack opposing teams with balanced scoring, and he liked that a number of different players were able to get on the score sheet.

“If you have one or two primary targets, it makes it easy to game plan. When you have four, five, six guys doing different things, it makes it more fun to coach, for sure, but it definitely gives us more opportunities and gives guys more one-on-one opportunities,” he explained. “It makes it hard to pack the middle when you have guys like Luke, Aven and Logan who can shoot. Charlie extends the floor well. They do a good job distributing, and I feel like they do a good job of looking to get the ball to each other a little bit more. And as a result, we’re getting a little easier opportunities. We just have to continue to try to learn from this and grow from it.”

Ball movement is still a work in progress, Fujita added, but his players made up for it by rebounding well and playing strong defense on Friday night. He also liked his team’s energy, and how it didn’t let any of the distractions from the night’s festivities spill over into the game.

“I don’t really see the game whether there’s five people or a packed house like this. I’m trying to get the guys to see the court like that, too,” he said. “The lines are our barrier. We have to stay within the lines, and I thought they did an awesome job of that tonight. In an environment like this, there could be a lot of distractions, and they did a really nice job of staying focused on what the goal was tonight.”

With the sights set on playoffs — the Whalers guaranteed themselves a spot with their win over Bridgehampton on January 13 — Hartstein and Desir, two of a handful of players left from last season’s memorable postseason run to the state Final Four, said there are similarities and differences from this year’s team to last year’s team. But the team’s goals and values remain the same.

“This year’s team is significantly younger,” Hartstein said. “As opposed to all seniors, it’s all juniors, with a freshman and sophomore thrown in there somewhere. I think this team has a lot of potential, but right now we’re not quite where we were at last year, just because of the maturity aspect of the team.

“Last year allowed us to learn what it took, mentally and physically, to get up there,” Desir added. “I think this year we’re able to learn and dictate, especially when times are tough. We’re able to push forward and now we can instill that into our younger unit right now. We just want to stay grateful and consistent.

“We’re working for something bigger right now,” Hartstein said. “Hopefully, we can go back to Glens Falls — but we’ll take things as they come.”

Pierson played at Babylon on Tuesday and will play at Southampton this Monday, January 30, at 6 p.m. before hosting Senior Night this Wednesday, February 1, against Port Jeff at 6:15 p.m.