Coach: ‘Who are you gonna guard?’
Executive’s balance leads to easy victory, its 10th straight
Two months ago, Dock Mennonite hosted Executive Education Academy Charter in a regular-season game and lost 67-53.
Wednesday night, in the first round of the PIAA 3A tournament, Dock Mennonite encountered an even stronger Raptors team in Allentown.
Jeremiah Bembry-Morcos, who wasn’t with Executive in the first game, scored 15 points, collected nine rebounds and four assists in a 67-44 rout of the District One champions.
Kobe Magee chipped in 17 points and 10 rebounds as Executive (20-4) won its 10th straight and advanced to the second round of the state tournament for the third straight year.
In its previous two second-round contests, both at the 2A level, the Raptors fell to Philadelphia-area powers. This time, the second round sends Executive north to take on District 4 champ Loyalsock on Saturday.
Is this the year it breaks through and gets to the final four? It’s certainly an Executive team that’s at least deep in quality players.
Against Dock, the Raptors broke free from a 15-15 tie early in the second quarter with a 16-2 run. To demonstrate the team’s balance, star player Jevin Muniz didn’t score a point in the spurt.
Instead, it was Magee who led the charge with seven points. Rylan Muniz added five and Jalil Schenck chipped in four.
“We preach to the guys that everybody’s going to have their moment,” Executive coach Ray Barbosa said. “One day it’s going to be your day and then it’s going to be somebody else’s day. We have a lot of guys who can score.”
Jevin Muniz, who had nine points in the first quarter, didn’t score at all in the second and didn’t score in the third until 2 minutes, 15 seconds were left. By then, the District 11 champs were up 44-27.
He still finished with a team-high 18 points in his final home game and has 1,488 points in his career.
“That team has too many weapons,” said Dock Mennonite coach Mike Fergus, who has more than 600 wins in his career and more than 100 at four different schools.
“We really wanted to guard Jevin Muniz, so I put a guard on him, Roman Kuhn, who got up underneath him and did a great job. But there are other guards who are really hard matchups for us. We were giving up inches and athleticism at every spot. We weren’t used to that athleticism and speed.”
Fergus was still proud of how his team (12-8) competed and kept it close enough that Executive kept its starters on the floor until the finish. Senior Steve Martin finished with 18 points for the Lansdale-based team.
However, Fergus left quite impressed with Executive.
“[Bembry-Morcos] gives them a whole another dimension,” he said. “And [Magee] flies under the radar, but he’s really good.
“Magee was killing us. He scores in a variety of ways ... garbage points, putbacks, drives to the bucket, hits outside shots. That team has a lot of pieces. Who are you gonna guard?”
Magee, a junior, said that while all the pieces are in place for Executive to register two more wins to get to Hershey for the March 27 3A title game, it will take more than that.
“It takes a lot of team effort, hustle and pride,” Magee said. “We’ve been showing that a lot lately. Last year, not really so much.”
He believes his team, which has won 20 games for the first time in school history, can still take it up a notch — and will.
“We’ve got a lot of talent, and if we all contribute, we can win states,” Magee said. “We have crazy balance. If everyone contributes, if everyone does their part, we’re going to get there.”
Barbosa, who has reached this point in the season several times before, said it wasn’t his team’s best performance but was memorable.
“This was a good reward for the kids to have a last home game in front of a nice crowd,” he said. “It was great to see so many people here.” But now it’s the road and a rugged foe.
“We know Loyalsock is going to be a tough game,” Barbosa said. “They have a really good program and play a unique style and are coached by the all-time leader in wins in Pennsylvania history [Ron Insinger, who recently won his 1,000th game].
“But we have a lot of confidence and are looking forward to the challenge.”
EXECUTIVE 67, DOCK MENNONITE 44
Dock Mennonite 11-8-14-11— 44
Executive Education 15-16-19-17— 67
DOCK MENNONITE (44)
Martin 6-145-618, Lapp 5-140-012, Johnson 2-50-05, Kuhn 2-72-2 7, Bultje 0-00-00, Camara 1-30-02. Totals 16-435-644.
EXECUTIVE (67)
J. Muniz 7-182-218, Schenck 3-120-06, Bembry-Morcos 5-115-8 15, Magee 6-95-617, R. Muniz 3-30-08, Watkins 1-10-03, Allieu 0-00-00. Totals 25-5412-1667.
3-pointers: DM (6-13) Martin 2, Lapp 2, Kuhn, Johnson. Executive (5-21) J. Muniz 2, R. Muniz.
Rebounds: DM 26(Lapp 7). Executive 31(Magee 10, Bembry-Morcos 9).
Assists: DM 6(Kuhn 3). Executive 15(Bembry-Morcos 4). Turnovers: DM 17, Executive 11.
Fouls: DM 12, Executive 7.