The Gold Standard of HS Hoops

Last week, I had the opportunity to cover the St. Anthony High School boy’s basketball celebration dinner in Jersey City.

Not familiar with the tiny, cash-strapped catholic school? How about high school hoops in general, for that matter?

Led by Hall of Fame coach Bob Hurley, St. Anthony is the premier high school basketball program in the country. Despite seemingly always on the brink of closure, the small Jersey City school has churned out some the nation’s best ballers and finest teams.

Major League Baseball has the Yankees. The NFL has the Steelers. High school basketball has Hurley and his Friars.

Perhaps I'm being a bit hyperbolic, comparing the Friars to the Yankees and Steelers. Then again, St. Anthony has been the subject of a New York Times best seller and had a season chronicled in the superb PBS documentary "The Street Stops Here."

This past season, the Friars went 33-0, won their 26^th state championship (24^th under Hurley) and were named the nation’s No. 1 team for the fourth time in school history. The pivotal moment of the Friars' season came on March 9, when they played archrival St. Patrick, of Elizabeth, N.J., in the state tournament.

Other than a match-up of bitter rivals separated by a mere 14 miles, the game featured the nation’s top two teams, as St. Patrick was ranked No. 1 in the polls at the time, with St. Anthony dwelling in the No. 2 spot.

Played in front of 8,000-plus fans at the Rutgers Athletic Center, St. Anthony stunningly routed St. Patrick in the fourth quarter and won the unofficial national championship game, 62-45.

While current University of Kentucky coach John Calipari was there that night to watch his blue chip signee Mike Gilchrest, of St. Patrick, surely even coach ‘Cal must have left the Rutgers campus impressed by the Friars.

Even Hurley, who has over 1,000 career victories on his Hall of Fame resume, was taken aback by just how big of a spectacle the game had been.

“That wasn’t a high school game,” Hurley told me at the dinner, as we spoke about the historic game.

After casting St. Patrick aside, St. Anthony went on to win the Non-Public B state championship and then the Tournament of Champions, finishing as both the top team in the state and country.

So last Thursday, the national champ Friars gathered once more to celebrate with their families, coaches and the school community. The players received national championship rings and custom jackets.

When you cover high school sports, you often find yourself at lackluster soccer games in the pouring rain or on a football sideline on a Friday night, knowing that your friends are out bar hopping and having fun without you.

But when you cover a St. Anthony game, no matter when or where it is, you feel apart of something much larger than a mere high school sporting event. A tradition of excellence exists at St. Anthony that no other high school program can claim.

For a young reporter like myself, it doesn’t get much better than interviewing a legend like Hurley and writing about the Friars.

Congrats on another banner season.