In need of assist, George School’s Luber turns to two ex-Broncs
Ben Luber has spent his entire life handing out assists. First at Council Rock North and then in the Big Ten at Penn State where he still ranks in the top-10 on the school’s all-time list. Later he moved into coaching with 10 years as a Division I assistant at Rider and Binghamton.
Last year he got the chance to run his own program when he was hired by the George School in Bucks County to be the new boys basketball coach. After a debut season in which he guided the team to a 12-7 record, the 2020-21 season has proved to be anything but normal.
Like a defender jumping a passing lane, the Luber family couldn’t see what was coming next. All of a sudden, the man who has spent his life in basketball dishing out assists, needed one himself.
“This was a season where I could have just canceled it and made it about me, but I had to find an answer to a problem,” Luber said. “You got to find a way to find a positive in these times, especially from a coaching standpoint. You’re still a leader of kids — college or high school — and you can kind of teach lessons.”
On Christmas, Luber’s wife, Nicki, who was pregnant with their second child, wasn’t feeling well and went to the emergency room. It turned out, she was having complications with the pregnancy and the Lubers’ daughter, Cecilia, was born on Jan. 1, about two-and-half months premature.
Cecilia has been in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) for the last eight weeks, and while both mother and baby are recovering, Luber needed to care for his young family, one that already has a 3-year old at home, all while trying to plan a basketball schedule set against the backdrop of a global pandemic.
The doctor instructed the Lubers to be even more careful with their quarantine and avoid mixing with any kind of crowd. That made coaching basketball impossible.
But Luber was determined to make sure his players at George got the season they deserve. Thanks to his connections at Rider, he enlisted the help of two former Broncs to coach the team while he takes a leave of absence.
Matt Lopez is serving as the acting head coach, while Anthony Durham is pitching in as the junior varsity coach and varsity assistant. The staff also includes Temple and Big-5 legend Mike Vreeswyk and former Binghamton standout Justin McFadden.
“When he came to me and said he needed help, it was a nobrainer,” said Lopez, who was Luber’s top assistant last season. “We haven’t really known each other for a while, but he’s somebody I call one of my closest friends. I’m a little taller than him, but almost like a big brother relationship.”
The 7-foot Lopez was a First Team All-MAAC selection at Rider during the 2014-15 season as he anchored a team that won 21 games and finished second in the league. If it had not been for a freak injury — he tore his ACL in the third to last game of the regular season — the Broncs may well have went on to win the league that year.
Lopez went on to play professionally in Puerto Rico, Paraguay, Mexico and Japan before he decided to get into coaching for good. Not that he wasn’t already headed down that path. Lopez made it a habit to return to Rider — he calls Rider home even though he only spent two years at the school — and volunteered his time working with the big men.
Since Luber was in between stints at Rider when Lopez was on the team, they didn’t actually meet until those workouts in the back practice gym. Lopez was on one end of the court working with the bigs, while Luber was instructing the guards on the other.
“He didn’t ask for anything, and that’s rare when people don’t ask for something first and they give their natural gifts,” Luber said. “One of Matt’s gifts is teaching the game. He does that naturally without anybody asking.”
When Lopez decided he was ready to jump two feet into coaching, Luber, who had left Rider to take over at George, hired him as his assistant. Luber joked that when Lopez first walked onto campus, students took their phones out to record him because of his massive frame. “That was one of those moments where I’m like no one will ever do that to me when I walk through the doors,” Luber recalled.
The players immediately gravitated toward him.
“I didn’t do a very good job of keeping a fourth wall up,” Lopez said of that first year in coaching. “I kind of approached the team as one of the guys because I was so accustomed to being a player in the gym that I was able to build a strong relationship with these guys, so I’m happy that now as things have progressed and I’ve had to take on more responsibility they can respect me as a coach.”
Durham joined the staff this year as a way to keep his mind sharp and get his feet wet with player development. He played professionally abroad in Cyprus and the Czech Republic after graduating from Rider in 2018, and while he still has pro baskets to score, the impact of the pandemic left him without a contract this season.
“This past year has been rough on everybody,” Durham said. “Everybody is going through their own challenges. I think people like me and people like Ben are built for adversity. Whatever adversity faces our way, we run through that wall and we handle it.”
Durham can certainly speak to that. He shook off injuries early in his career and resisted the urge to transfer — thanks to some long conversations with Luber who had rejoined the Rider staff by then — and was one of the team’s most indispensable players during the 2017-18 season in which it won the
MAAC regular-season title.
“Maybe two weeks prior to our season starting, we didn’t think we were going to have one at all,” Luber said. “(Then) everything just flipped and Matt stepped in and Anthony was available as well. The two of them get along really well and work well together. It was a perfect storm for me and a great opportunity for them as well. When your assistants say ‘whatever you need’ and you know they mean it and they can handle the responsibility, that’s a comforting feeling so I can take care of my family and focus on what is really most important in my life.
George is 2-1 in this abbreviated season and has an opportunity to avenge its loss to the Perkiomen School in its next game.
“I’m one of those ducks on the pond,” Lopez said. “I look like I’m just floating around, but under the water my feet are kicking, but I don’t like to be emotional on the sideline. I like to stay calm, but in the practice room, yes, for sure.”
“He’s a hidden gem,” Luber said. “I like that. I can find talent.”
Especially when they can offer an assist.
“During a time when someone needs an assist,” Luber said, “and I gave out tons of assists in my career, I’m very thankful for Matt and Anthony for throwing one back my way.”