No one was prepared for it to end just yet and when it did, there were heartfelt hugs and plenty of tears shed before players and coaches gathered themselves and held their heads high in the belief that this winter’s Huntington boys’ basketball team breathed new life into the program and brought excitement back to the high school.
The Blue Devils’ struggles in the sport are well known across the county and Long Island, but when Ken Parham assumed the head coaching position late last spring, he was determined to turn around the program’s fortunes.
Parham exclaimed that he had never failed at anything in his life and he wasn’t about to start now. The experienced coach, who has won awards as the coach of Bay Shore’s boys’ team; St. Anthony’s girls’ team and New York Tech’s NCAA Division II women’s team immediately went to work with an intramural program and offseason leagues.
Changing the program’s culture and mindset and installing an entirely new system took time; perhaps more time than was originally thought necessary. Clayton Ward returned to Huntington from Long Island Lutheran High School and Hunter Borenstein came back from St. Dominic. Returnees Max Rentsch, Dylan Coleman and Kevin Drake along with several other key veterans and a cast of newcomers to the varsity all came together to start winning games.
Not even a flood in the Huntington gym, which necessitated a mid-January move to Walt Whitman for the Blue Devils’ remaining home games and to Jack Abrams STEM Magnet School for practices stopped the momentum.
Huge late season upset wins against Bellport and Copiague propelled the Blue Devils into the post-season for the first time in years. A 50-38 victory over Newfield gave Huntington its first playoff win in a long time.
With the wins came the crowds just like everyone knew they would. Everyone loves a winner and Huntington basketball started winning and everyone at the high school wanted to be a part of it.
The Blue Devils who comprised the 2021/22 team will always remember the packed bleachers during the late season and playoff runs. These players and coaches brought the fun back. This group put together a 12-10 record and came close to winning several more contests.
Every game had a new hero. There were some bumps in the road, but no one lost confidence, not even during a tough losing streak. The players bought into Parham’s philosophy. No coach works harder. Parham spent hours breaking down films, figuring out a way to beat teams in a very tough league.
“I gave this team everything that I had,” said Parham after losing to No. 1 Brentwood in the county quarterfinals. “These guys will always remember they won 12 games, including a playoff game. They played before some big crowds and won some big games. They had fun and put the sport back on the map at Huntington High School.”
But as far as they have come, the Blue Devils were unable to stay with powerful Brentwood, which raced out to a 27-11 lead in their home gym. Huntington kept it close in the second and fourth quarters, being outscored in both, 21-19 and 16-15 respectively. But the Indians’ 22-10 third quarter run put the game firmly out of reach.
When it was over, there were tears in the eyes of Huntington’s players. Perhaps Max Rentsch took the loss the hardest and he openly wept in the minutes following the game. The senior has meant so much to the Blue Devils over the years. This winter he reinvented himself, going from an outside shooter to an all-around great player whose twisting and turning scoring drives to the basket were art in motion and who became one of Suffolk’s best at pulling down rebounds.
Borenstein had 14 points against Brentwood and Drake had 12, despite taking a hard shot to his nose that bled so much on the court it caused the game to be delayed more than five minutes while four people worked to clean up the mess.
Rentsch had an unusually low seven points as Brentwood suffocated him, but the teenager still managed to tally six rebounds, six assists and a steal. Coleman had six assists. Ward scored eight points and added five rebounds.
After the game, Parham told the team to take off two weeks. Then intramurals will begin anew. Parham wants to bring a county championship to Huntington and only a fool would bet against the veteran coach.
