Bergen Catholic pulls off a stunning upset against top-ranked Hudson Catholic in the Big Jersey Basketball Challenge, thanks to a late-game press and career-high performances from Julius Avent and Jaden Brown.
In the restaurant and service industries, the number 86 is an informal way of saying that something or someone is ejected, canceled, barred, or simply no longer available. After trailing by as many as 14 points midway in the third quarter and still down by 10 entering the fourth, the Crusaders ordered up No. 88 to apply full-court pressure and make life particularly difficult on the inbound passer in Hudson Catholic’s offense.
With 6-7 sophomore Julius Avent in the face and mind of that passer and his teammates handling their duties with textbook denial, Bergen Catholic forced two five-second turnovers in the last 1:23 of regulation and a third late in overtime to add the exclamation points to an upset that seemed in the making since the latter half of the fourth quarter. Avent forced overtime with 51 seconds to go in the fourth, and junior guard Jaden Brown scored four of his career-high 29 points in overtime to rally the sixth-ranked Crusaders to a 65-62 upset over top-ranked Hudson Catholic at the Big Jersey Basketball Challenge Sunday afternoon at Caldwell University. 'It’s called 88 and we just pressed up high. I think we should have doing that a little bit earlier because they were getting tired,“ Brown said. ”But it ended up well because they tired at the end of the game and we weren’t.' Behind the career scoring highs of Brown and Avent with 26 points and that smothering press, Hudson Catholic (10-2) is likely to take a fall from No. 1 when the latest NJ.com rankings are posted Tuesday morning. Bergen (8-3) began the season at No. 1, but dropped following a 65-51 loss New Year’s Day to No. 3 St. Peter’s Prep. “This is special,” Avent said of the upset, “but when you come into an (Non-Public) A game, anyone can be No. 1. We just have to keep this up every time.” The scoring load carried by Brown and Avent also helped compensate for the unusually low output by 6-7 senior forward Declan Wucherpfenning. He came in averaging a team-high 20.3 pints, but was held to five. Wucherpfenning did collected nine rebounds and blocked a shot. 'Declan does other things that aren’t recorded on the stat sheet that are very important to us,' Brown said. “Ands if I have a bad game, Declan and Julius take care of me. We play through each other. I love my teammates.” Bergen Catholic is a bit longer overall than Hudson, and that heightened the potency of its trap. And at 6-7 with rangy athleticism, Avent was an obstruction on the inbound pass. Imposing one 5-second call in a game against a high-level opponent is good. A second is outstanding. Three is unique. “They (teammates) did a good job of denying the ball, too. I was just trying to be a pest on the inbound and make it tough on the throw-in.” That defense alone would have been a tremendous contribution from Avent, who had so much more to offer to help key the comeback along with the 6-3 Brown. The son of former Shabazz and Seton Hall University star Anthony Avent scored seven points in the second quarter to help prevent hot-handed Hudson Catholic from making too much separation. He began the quarter with a 3-pointer and later scored twice at the rim to keep his club to within 28-20. Senior guard Omari Moore hit for 10 of his team-high 24 points and senior wing Keith McKnight had eight of his 15 in that first half for Hudson Catholic. Moore buried two of his five 3-pointers in the first 4:24 of the third quarter as the Hawks' led grew to 40-26.
HIGH SCHOOL BASKETBALL UPSET PRESS DEFENSE BERGEN CATHOLIC HUDSON CATHOLIC
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