The reality of Lyndhurst’s boys basketball season being over didn’t really hit coaches Perrin Mosca and Jason Romer until the next day when, for the first time since November, there wasn’t a practice to run after school.
“We were saying the next day (on Wednesday) and we’re like, ‘oh, we got nothing to do today,’” Mosca said. “It was a little weird because we expected to keep playing.”
Unfortunately for Lyndhurst there weren’t any more games to play as a historic and magical season for the Golden Bears came to an end on Tuesday evening when it lost a 74-70 double-overtime heartbreaker to Ramsey in the NJSIAA Group 2 semifinals in Bloomfield.
The loss ended Lyndhurst’s season, one that included its first state sectional title in 45 years, with a 21-10 record.
“We had a lot of goals and we hit them all,” said Mosca. “It was just a crazy year. These kids, they did a great job and so happy for them that they were able to get to these goals.
“We set these goals, they hit them all, had a great year and topped off with that state sectional championship.That was amazing.”
Four days after hitting the game-winning shot heard around Lyndhurst, star senior Johnny Chaname followed with the biggest game of his storied career, finishing with a career-high 38 points.
Chaname hit buzzer-beating 3-pointers to end the first and second quarters and was merely getting started.
Chaname forced overtime when he made a layup to tie the game at 53-all with three seconds left in the regulation. Then, in the first overtime, another Chaname layup in the final seconds tied the game at 62-62 to force a second overtime.
“This was by far his craziest game. He was doing everything on his own (at times),” Mosca said about Chaname, who finishes his career with 1,431 points. “It was crazy how at the end of the first quarter, he hit a buzzer beater three. At the end of the second quarter he hit a buzzer beating three. The end of regulation hit a two to tie. At the end of the first overtime, he hit a two to tie. It was just insane. He almost willed us to victory, him by himself.”
Ramsey scored the first five points of the second overtime as Owen Farley hit a 3-pointer and Julien Quinerly followed with a pair of free throws. Despite four points in the second overtime by Sam Ijeh, the Bears were never able to overcome the deficit as Charlie Taylor put the game away with two free throws with 1.6 seconds left.
“I told them after the game, you guys have done something that this town hasn’t seen in 45 years, so just don’t put your head down, keep your head up,” Mosca said. “And then I told the younger guys to, ‘just use this as fuel. If you want to win that group two state title, you have a couple years to do that. So make it burn inside of you so you’re able to get there next year or the year after.’ For a lot of the kids, (the loss) was tough on them, but we’re going to just keep working and trying to get there.”
Ijeh, the other senior starter along with Chaname, had a career-high 16 points, 12 rebounds and five blocks in his final game, capping off a breakout season where he went from an afterthought in the summer to by far, Lyndhurst’s top forward, averaging 9.0 points and 6.4 rebounds per game.
Sophomore Avery Cano added 16 points, six rebounds and five assists.
Cano (16.8 points, 5.5 rebounds and 5.0 assists per game) and fellow sophomores Filoteo Mosca (11.7 points, 6.3 rebounds per game), Josh Lorenzo and Esai Fernandez headline a strong group of projected returners that also includes forward Liony Lopez, who missed all of this season due to injury.
“As a coach and staff, we talked about this being not just a one year thing. We’re in this for the long haul,” Mosca said. “We’re ready to get these kids rolling every year. Even last year when we played good, we were saying we’re not rebuilding, we’re just reloading over here at Lyndhurst. So we have the kids that are putting the effort in and the time in and the working and I think we can definitely keep this thing rolling.”
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Jason Bernstein | Observer Sports Writer
Jason Bernstein joined The Observer as its sports writer in March 2022, following the retirement of Jim Hague. He has a wealth of sports-writing experience, including for NJ Advance Media (nj.com, The Jersey Journal, The Star-Ledger.)