Seaholm shows determination despite fall to Bloomfield Hills in Spenser Adams’ head coaching debut – The Oakland Press

On November 27, 2024By Pranco

BLOOMFIELD HILLS – The faces have changed dramatically, but the outcome of Tuesday night’s season opener between Birmingham Seaholm and Bloomfield Hills was virtually identical to last year’s district meet.

The Black Hawks, a 43-39 winner in that postseason matchup, fought off a fourth-quarter comeback from the Maples to open the year with a 42-38 victory.

That’s how it ended, even though Seaholm trailed by 10 to start the fourth quarter. Spenser Adams, defensive coordinator for the Maples football team, made his debut as a head coach and watched his team fight back and almost give him a victory despite a turnover-laden start to the game.

“We don’t have a lot of varsity experience back, so we knew there would be jitters early on,” Adams said. “We got down a little early and had to scratch and claw and fight our way back, but I think once our kids started focusing on competing instead of the fear of the first time they were in a varsity game , I thought We played well and turned it into a kind of game.”

Adams said afterward that senior point guard Charlie Gorcyca (13 points) asks him to open the gym at 6:30 a.m. at least twice a week to get shots in, and Gorcyca’s early bird work has paid off at the free throw line, where he made all but one of his nine free-throw attempts. Some of that came on a 10-0 run that also included a boundary foul by senior Cole French that nearly wiped out the Black Hawks’ 14-point lead.

After Bloomfield Hills’ Da’ron Mason, who had a game-high 14 points, handed it off to fellow junior Brennan Bies for a fast-break layup to end the unanswered run, Patrick Hughes hit a triple with 9.3 seconds left to cross the finish line. 41-38, but a free throw afterward from sophomore Carter Canfield (10 points) was enough to secure the victory for the Black Hawks.

“We’re really young and we’ve been playing young,” Black Hawks head coach Brian Canfield said. “At the end of the game (we had) three sophomores and two juniors. We had a few possessions where we tried to force a pass inside, key point, turnover… We just had to kill the clock at that point. In defense we were not running at ball speed. We had a small lead and maybe we thought we got too comfortable, openly looked at some guys and recovered too late.

I’m glad we messed up some things, hopefully we can learn from it and still get the win.”

Bloomfield Hills’ Anthony Ammori (11) tries to save a floater attempt from Seaholm’s Charlie Gorcyca in Tuesday’s match. The Black Hawks won 42-38. (BRYAN EVERSON – MediaNews Group)

Mason scored 10 of his points in the first half to give the Black Hawks a 22-15 halftime lead and looked like a player ready to take another leap forward.

“He plays like a fifth-year senior, but he’s a junior,” Canfield said of Mason. “Last year I thought he had some of the most growth from the beginning of the year to the end of any guy I’ve ever coached. And he will certainly be a player to watch in our conference and in the province.”

A native of southern Indiana — the origin of his hoops passion — Adams is better known in Seaholm for his work under Jim DeWald and a football program that has been consistent winners (including a trip to the semifinals in 2019 when Adams arrived). Now he has a chance to shape a program that graduates double-digit seniors and returns just three players with varsity experience.

It’s not surprising that Adams, along with veteran assistants James McCulloh and Pat Clancy (both former head coaches), are trying to instill some of that tough toughness in his hardwood guys.

“We start practice with a little two-minute drill,” Adams said. “That’s just called toughness. It’s all about bringing energy and that kind of mentality into what we’re going to do, and then, you know, we’re really just preaching the effort on the defensive side, and we know that’s going to carry over to the offense.

Photo gallery of Birmingham Seaholm vs. Bloomfield Hills in OAA white boys basketball action

But with so many new faces, there is one difference between Adams’ favorite sports that should play in Seaholm’s favor.

“There will definitely be some growing pains with the experience, but I just tell them to keep focusing on improvement and not results and everything will be fine,” Adams said. “The nice thing about basketball is you don’t have to play in the playoffs, right? You can figure out who you are as a team, keep getting better and, you know, give some people a chance. The stretch.”

Bloomfield Hills resumes action at Troy Athens on December 3, while Seaholm returns to action against rival Groves on December 6.