City of Basketball Love

CoBL Staff (@hooplove215)
--

It’s small-college commitment season, as many Division II and Division III schools start filling up their 2016 recruiting classes.

Here are three short stories about a trio of local commits headed to area D-III schools (for a full list of commitments you can check out our 2016 profiles page):

~~~

Coatesville shooting guard head to CSAC powerhouse

Coatesville sharpshooter Rome Boyer, a man of few words, kept his obligatory college announcement tweet short and simple. All he needed was one word and a number.

“Gwynedd 2020” was all he wrote.

Boyer, dubbed this season by many of his teammates as “Big Shot Rome,” made the next step in his basketball and academic career earlier this month, committing to play for head coach John Baron and the Griffins.

It’s safe to say he prefers to let his game speak for itself, and his accomplishments at Coatesville did just that.

Under the tutelage of head coach Chuck Moore, Boyer led the Red Raiders to a Ches-Mont title and district one top seed this season, coming up with multiple clutch plays along the way.

“I feel like I’m leaving a good taste in the mouth for everybody, I didn’t want to leave on a bad note for the program, I’m glad we were able to make history. I gave it my all.”

At first, when Moore took the Coatesville job three years ago, Boyer admittedly wasn’t too sure about him. It took some getting used to, but by the end of his career at Coatesville, Boyer developed a wonderful relationship with the Red Raiders’ coaching staff, and Moore in particular.

“There’s no better staff," he said. "Coach Moore, I’ve been with him since I was in tenth grade. At first I wasn’t too sure about him, but he really developed my game.”

Now, the 6-4 guard will have to get used to a new coaching staff and a new school, but he’s more than ready to take that next step, and it’s clear to him that Gwynedd-Mercy is the perfect fit.

“I just like the school in general, it’s really clean, the staff is really nice,” said Boyer. “They’ve got a good basketball program, and they did really well this year.

“I see myself as a great fit for it, they’ve got a lot of guards that are leaving,” he added. “I love the style of play.”

From a non-basketball standpoint, Boyer mentioned that Gwynedd has a great program for his intended major, business.

This past season, as Boyer mentioned, the Griffins finished 22-7, winning the CSAC title and reaching the second round of the NCAA Division III tournament.

However, that team will be graduating four guards, giving Boyer a chance to get involved early in his four-year career, just like he did in high school.

“I’m glad that I have the chance of playing right away,” he said. “Hopefully I can build the program and lead us to a championship, like I did for Coatesville.”

~~~

Harkins hoping to help turn around John Jay

Wyatt Harkins stumbled upon John Jay almost by accident.

The New York school initially caught Harkins’ eye last summer when, while visiting New York City, a friend told him that the 52-year-old school with 13,000 undergraduates specializes in Criminal Justice.

That fit perfectly with the Delco Christian senior, who plans to go into a career with local law enforcement or the FBI after graduation.

“I definitely have an interest in just being able to help out and serve in some way,” he said, “I don’t want to really be stuck behind a desk.”

So Harkins immediately emailed the school’s head coach and scheduled a visit.

Although Harkins had never thought about going to a city school growing up, he warmed to the idea after his first trip to campus.

“When I got up there I was like wow, this is amazing, I’ve never seen anything like this before,” Harkins said, “The campus is absolutely beautiful.”

Originally his parents were concerned about the long trek to New York, but over time he managed to convince them that John Jay was truly the best fit for him.

Meanwhile, the dedication and enthusiasm of a coaching staff led by Ryan Hyland were convincing him of the same fact. And on Sunday he made his decision official, committing to become a Bloodhound this fall.

“(Hyland) definitely has a lot of confidence, which I really like as a player,” Harkins said, “I also have a lot of confidence.”

Harkins also feels that his game will translate well under Hyland.

“Some of the stuff he runs at his program is pretty similar to what (Delco Christian) coach (Don) Davis has been having us do,” Harkins said, “It will be a good fit.”

Harkins is optimistic that Hyland can turn around a young Bloodhounds team that only won three games last season. Otherwise he wouldn’t have chosen John Jay over Lock Haven and a handful of other D-III schools who were pursuing him.

He admits the coaching staff factored greatly into his decision.

“I really liked the coaches there,” Harkins said, “they showed a lot of interest in me and kept up positive communication pretty much from the day I stepped on campus and took a visit.”

~~~

Ridley’s Wing commits to De Sales

Just two weeks before Ridley forward Julian Wing his final college decision, he had two Division III schools left on his list. The long and complex college process had come down to Cabrini and DeSales.

“Those two weeks, I just looked at the logistics and stuff, the programs and how they did, this year and past years,” said Wing.

“The process was good, it was tough to decide between colleges, I had like five offers, then I took it down to three, PSU-Harrisburg, Cabrini, and De Sales, then I took it down to two with Cabrini and De Sales, and went from there.”

In the end it was the De Sales coaching staff, specifically head coach Scott Coval, that won him over.

“I just liked the coaches from De Sales, the head coach has been coaching there for 22 years, (Coval) coached at Penn State, Lafayette, and now he’s coaching there, he’s a good head coach," he said. "The assistant coach is good too, he was All-American, and the other assistant coach was telling me how he’s a good coach and the only reason he stayed was because of the head coach, I just like him.”

Wing, who is familiar with success as part of the Ridley Raiders’ program, which made two district semifinal appearances and won two Central League titles in his four-year career. His future head coach, Coval, is much more accomplished in his longer career.

Coval owns six Freedom Conference Coach of the Year awards in his 22 years, and is the winningest coach in De Sales history,

“They said I should be good for the program because of my defense, they said they were going to try to put me on the wing, try to come off of ball screens and shoot and just work with them.”

Wing mentioned that one of his favorite memories of his time at Ridley was winning two league titles he won, so it’s fitting that he joins a school that has won three Freedom Conference titles in the last seven seasons.

Putting trophies into a new trophy case at De Sales will certainly be the next order of business as Wing takes the next step in his basketball career.