Fred Thomas boys win program’s first trophy

Sussex Academy hosted the Capital Classic championship games on Valentine’s Day, concluding the middle school basketball season for local teams.

Cape saw three teams, Fred Thomas boys and both Beacon teams, compete for a title, with Fred Thomas clinching the school’s first boys’ basketball trophy.

“It feels great. I've been wanting this for a very long time,” said eighth-grader Arristyn Richards. “Been doing this since I was a little kid.”

Richards joined eighth-grader Cam Bell on the all-bracket team as the duo ended their middle school careers with a dub.

“It's our first trophy for our school,” Bell said. “It's only two years old, so it means a lot.”

Fred Thomas upended Newark Charter 34-30 in the championship game.

“Great team. They played really hard, but we had to come in here and take care of business,” Richards said.

TCOB for the Freds starts and ends without the rock.

“Here at Fred Thomas, we preached defense, defense, defense,” coach Haywood Burton said. “If you can't play defense, you can't play for us. We ran a lot in practice because defense takes energy, so they bought in, they were very competitive, they played hard, and we made our bones on the defensive end.”

“We played good defense, our shots were falling and we were rebounding really well,” Bell said.

Eighth-grader Robbie Myers received the Sportsmanship Award for his clean play, despite the paint being hostile territory.

If we can play defense and we can rebound, we can win,” Burton said. “Pat Riley had a famous quote, ‘No rebound, no ring.’”

Beacon’s squads had to settle for second place, as the boys lost to Chipman and the girls to Fifer.

But a few Vikings were honored for their efforts.

Seventh-grader Lucas Skonieczki and eighth-grader Nigel Ament were named to their bracket’s all-star team.

For the girls, eighth-graders Kelly Neustadter and London Steigerwalt earned all-bracket honors.