Wallace preaching attitude and discipline to young Berkeley boys hoopsters
By David Shelton
Senior Writer
Moncks Corner – In his first season as the varsity boys basketball coach at Berkeley High School, Joey Wallace is trying to instill the proper discipline and attitude into a young team.
Wallace knows that if he can establish a way of doing things in the younger players that the future of the program will be stronger.
The former star athlete at St. Stephen High School spent nine years as an assistant coach at Timberland before moving over to Berkeley. While many will point to the team’s overall record as a lack of success, the coach says bigger things are at work.
“For me, the first thing is character and we will have players in our program who do the right things on the court, in the classroom and in our community,” said Wallace. “We have had to dismiss a few players from the basketball program because they did not want to behave as they are supposed to or do the work in the classroom. It is unfortunate that we lost a few but hopefully they will learn and our program will become stronger.
“I think we are laying the groundwork for the future right now. We’re trying to do what we can this year in terms of being competitive but the bigger picture is going to be better. The players are starting to understand what I expect of them and this team is responding very well overall.”
Berkeley’s record entering play on January 31 was 6-13 overall and 2-4 in region 6-AAA. The Stags have been in several close games throughout the season. The team had two starters returning in senior forward Matthew Bryant and senior guard Devante Cunningham. However, Cunningham missed more than half of the year with eligibility issues and Bryant missed five or six games with an injury.
“We are pretty young overall in terms of experience and playing together,” said Wallace. “We’re competing pretty well but we do have issues offensively. We have a hard time getting consistent scoring and that has hurt us in some games. Defensively we have a great effort and we’ve been pretty solid.
“We’re starting to gel a little better here at the end of the season and maybe we can finish strong and set the tone for the off-season. The off-season will be big for us. We have six sophomores on the varsity and we have nine sophomores on the junior varsity so we have the potential to be better if we can work hard.”
Sophomores Matthew Harkness and Diamante Harley have been solid performers this season. Junior Jaden Brown is a promising guard and senior Rashawn Hutchinson has provided spark off the bench.
With Bryant healthy, the Stags can get more of an inside presence as he is a capable double digit scorer. Cunningham provides added scoring potential and is also a solid defender.
“I see us competing down to the end and I think if we put it all together, we could upset some teams and sneak into the playoffs,” said Wallace.
Berkeley wrestlers building for the future
With only three seniors among a roster of 26, the Berkeley wrestling team battled inexperience all season long.
Coach Ernest Houston says the team worked hard and competed well but the number of wins was a little short of his goal. Berkeley finished the season with a 20-13 duals record but failed to win a match in region 8-AAA.
“We wrestled a lot of close matches in the region but we didn’t win any (as a team) so that was disappointing,” said Houston.
The lone seniors among the starting lineup this winter included Zach Moore at 145 pounds, Lashad Jones at 140 and Daryus Smalls at 195.
The top wrestler in the program currently is DeAndre Robinson, who competes at 120 and 126. He was the class AAA state runner-up last year and is one of the favorites this season.
Robinson shared the two weight classes with Dominick Gadson.
Sophomore Juan Salazar and freshman Charles Anderson shared time as the starter in the 106-pound weight class. Caleb Byrd started in the 113-pound weight classification.
Sharing time at 132 over the course of the season were Isaiah Harris and Travis Jackson, who came up from the jayvee to wrestle varsity matches.
Tyler Mills worked most of the season at 152 with Moore also moving up to that weight class on occasion.
Alex King wrestled at 160 and Alonzo McGill wrestled at 170.
Daniel Driggers was the team’s 182-pounder and Jeremy Hardy wrestled at 220.
Catherine Money was the lone female in the program this season but did not compete in a varsity match this season.
“We’d like to get the numbers up some but this is a tough sport and some kids don’t want to put in the work that it takes to compete,” said Houston. “We have a lot coming back next year. Hopefully they will improve and help us compete a little better next year.”
