Shen boys basketball rebounds into regional
CLIFTON PARK, N.Y. » Only Shenendehowa seniors Chris Hulbert and Jake Dzikas had a front row seat to the Plainsmen’s New York State Public High School Athletic Association title run three years ago.
They also had that same vantage point to last year’s tumultuous season that saw its top player leave the team and Shenendehowa bow out in the Class AA quarterfinal to LaSalle.
Now the Plainsmen are back on top, capturing the Class AA title after surviving a battle with Colonie and will face No. 2 ranked and unbeaten Liverpool at 6:45 p.m. tonight at Hudson Valley Community College in regional play.
Senior Chris Hulbert is hoping this sequel has another happy ending.
“I think it makes it more special because being on top and then going back down again it’s a huge difference in seasons,” Chris Hulbert said earlier this week. “You had a great season and then not what you expected for it to be and then you had to work that much harder to get back on top.
“I think last season added fuel to the fire to get back on top, really worked harder in the off-season and I really wanted to push these guys to reach our full potential because I know what we could do and we could make an impact this season and we did.”
Things have changed from that state championship season, players have come and gone, several graduated, some playing Division I, some spending a year at prep school and along with it, Hulbert’s role has changed.
“I was just a practice guy really, I didn’t get in much,” Hulbert said about his sophomore year. “I saw the floor about every game, but give Kevin (Huerter) or someone a break. Junior year I played substantial minutes, but I wasn’t the star player of the team. I would hit my shots, do my role.
“This year I feel like I’m more of a leader, I’m responsible for bringing the team together in times of need, lead the team defensively and try to spark something when times are tough and a key component to this
team for any adversity that hits us. Every team needs a leader and I think I’m that guy for this team.”
As a cagy veteran to the Plainsmen squad, Hulbert almost needed players to wear name tags during tryouts.
“At the beginning of this season I was almost foreign to some of the kids,” Hulbert said. “I didn’t know most of the kids, they were coming from JV and it was tough at first because when you have that chemistry you play a lot better as at team, you pass the ball more.
“As the season progressed this team really got close, made it that more enjoyable to just play with them. When you’re playing with kids that you enjoy being around it makes the game that much more fun, that much easier for you guys to work as a team and just keep the flow going in games. I feel like the team had the same kind of bond between players, when we won the sectional championship and I think it’s a huge component that is overlooked in high school sports.”
While fans, parents and local sports media talk about the Shenendehowa state title season as if it was yesterday, for this group of Plainsmen basketball players it could be a module in American History.
“It’s four months to the day that our season started, Nov. 6 our season started,” Shenendehowa coach Tony Dzikas said. “I don’t know how much their memory goes back a whole another year.
“I can talk about it, but it does seem like a lifetime ago that we were talking about playing in a regional against Bishop Ludden at Hudson Valley, that seems like a long time ago.”
The focus is the future and Saturday’s contest against Section III (Syracuse) champion, Liverpool.
“They’ve got some tremendous athletes, they have a DI basketball player who has been offered by several DI programs, we’re going to have to really defend,” Dzikas said. “They can score 90 easy, so we’re going to have to defend in order to stay with them. We have to give ourselves a chance at the end. We have to rebound, we have to defense.