Your source for Lancaster-Lebanon League Boys Basketball

 
 
 
All The Wright Moves: Isaiah Wright, Solanco, Power Through Tough Defeat As Golden Mules Respond By Toppling Ephrata To Score Key Road Victory, Continue Upward Trajectory
 

All The Wright Moves: Isaiah Wright, Solanco, Power Through Tough Defeat As Golden Mules Respond By Toppling Ephrata To Score Key Road Victory, Continue Upward Trajectory

Written by: Andy Herr on January 10, 2025

 

 

(Isaiah Wright. LLHoops POG In Solanco Road Win Over Ephrata)

 

Around this time of year, call it early to mid-January, this is usually the time during the season when the picture becomes a little clearer. The time of year when the section races take shape and teams either separate, hold on, or fade away towards the bottom. As far as this 2024-25 campaign most specifically, Lancaster-Lebanon League Section Two is indeed no different in that regard when it comes to that sentiment.

To this point, it’d be fair to say that the rest of divisional cast is trying to chase – if not flat-out keep up – with Warwick seeing as how the Warriors head into next week as the division’s lone undefeated squad that has prevailed against everyone else, save for E-town, with the first matchup between the Bears and Warriors slated for next Thursday night over in Elizabethtown. Now, if you wanted to outright assume and just grant clemency to Warwick heading into the back half and guesstimate that they’ll inevitably capture one of the two slots awarded into the league playoffs next month, then who would be the ones there to join them?

For now, you’d have to say that the Ephrata Mounts might have as sound of an argument as anyone else at the moment.

Coming into their Thursday night makeup game after Monday’s washout – or snow out – against Solanco, the purple and yellow couldn’t have been sitting much better with where we’re at right now on the calendar.

Yes, while the Mounts fell to that aforementioned Warwick squad by nearly 20 on the Warriors’ home floor last week, Ephrata had handled their business elsewhere within the schedule considering the Mountaineers remained just a game out of first place given their 4-1 section record against the rest of the field not named Warwick. Granted, while maybe we’re not exactly in “must win” territory quite yet, protecting your home floor, especially with the likes of Conestoga Valley flashing marketed improvement over the last week and change, slipping up here would at the very least not be the recommended course of action.

Problem was, someone forgot to tell Solanco that they were supposed to play nice here in this scenario.

Alright. On the surface, seeing the Golden Mules enter Thursday night with a 3-10 overall record — still lugging an 0-fer around with them inside the section — probably wouldn’t have struck fear into anyone just looking from afar. Touche. But for those in the know, there’s a lot more here than meets the eye. Since Christmas on, something has appeared to flip for the boys’ basketball team located down in the south end.

After not just winning their own holiday tournament in vanquishing the likes of Oxford and Kennard-Dale respectively, the Mules have pushed their other two opponents to the brink when you look at just a six-point loss at the hands of Garden Spot before making perennial league stalwart, Lampeter-Strasburg, sweat bullets on their own home floor before finally turning away a very game Solanco effort in the waning stages just 24 hours prior to the Mules loading up the bus and getting right back at it in playing at Ephrata.

So yeah. While Solanco may have been sitting well below .500 in terms of their season as a whole, something has appeared to change recently down in Quarryville. And whether they may have planned for it or not, Ephrata was about to receive a first-hand lesson.

If you would’ve come to Ephrata Middle School on this night without no knowledge of the current situation for either one of these two squads, you would’ve assumed – at least from the first few minutes – that Solanco was the team that had the most ramifications placed upon them.

Hard to argue considering how the visitors wasted no time in storming out of the chute en route to a quick 10-3 early cushion following a pullup jumper knocked down by way of junior guard, Nolan Wagner, before the Mounts finally broke free from their current 9-0 hex levied against them with a timely triple knocked down by senior guard, Landry Kopp, on their ensuing possession following the Wagner J with 2:49 left to play in the opening frame.

And while Solanco had largely dictated the terms of engagement throughout the first eight minutes, their lead didn’t feel all that safe seeing as how the Mounts largely got out of dodge unscathed despite trailing by a measly 12-8 difference upon entering the second act.

It wouldn’t take long for that lead to eventually change hands as it turned out though.

For that, the hosts would reclaim the lead behind a pair of hard-nosed takes to the tin courtesy of senior forward, Brayden Brown, as Brown’s latest deuce amid the bunch made it a 17-15 Ephrata advantage with now half of the second quarter already having been expired.

Undeterred however, Solanco wouldn’t be tardy when it came to offering up a counterpunch of their own.

In that respect, the Mules surged back in front by a 20-17 count behind the efforts of Daniel Bailey and Isaiah Wright respectively, as a Bailey deuce and a Wright cold-blooded, step-back trifecta – right in front of the Ephrata bench no less – put the guests up by three with now 1:45 still showing on the second quarter timer.

Speaking of undeterred however, the same could just as easily be said for the Mounts inside of the final 120 seconds of the first half.

Case in point, Ephrata seen heading to the clubhouse for the halftime respite with a 24-23 lead behind the aid of a Marqus Hardin and Brayden Brown pair of buckets located within the waning stages to possibly give the Mounts a lift and a new lease on life to begin the second half on Thursday night.

However, much like L-S, a team near the top of their own section standings inside Section Three discovered just one night prior, this Solanco crew relishes the chance to come up with roadkill against a team near the top of the pecking order. Yes, not even Ephrata would be prone to immunity either.

That said, at the start of the third quarter however, it would’ve been understandable as to how and why Solanco may have not been able to recover from this latest gut punch.

Despite playing with the lead most of the first 16 minutes, Solanco’s surrender to that late Mounts’ rally down the stretch sent them into the half on the losing side of the score. Obviously, that could rightly be discouraging to say the least when they may not have had the finite evidence to suggest they had largely been the superior team up until that point. Then, add on the fact that Ephrata came out of the gates still swinging given Grayson Shellhammer knocking down a deep two after a wonderful cross-court dime fed to him by way of Cayden Landis on the Mounts’ opening possession of the third stanza, and it’s easy to see how this one could’ve started slipping away from those donning the black and yellow school colors.  

But as we’ve seen over the last couple of weeks, there’s something different about Solanco these days. Something fearless.

In fact, while staring down the barrel of what at the time was their largest deficit of the night in trailing by all of three points following the Shellhammer bucket, Solanco responded in kind to the task at hand.  

There, despite having been without a point for about 20 minutes of real time considering the halftime recess added in between, a crucial reverse finish at the tin compiled by junior forward, Kiran Ludgate, knotted things back at 26-26 while also helping the Mules breathe a bit easier seeing as how they remained still on level footing despite taking Ephrata’s heftiest punch levied against them of the entire evening. From there, a silky-smooth pullup jumper sunk by another fellow junior, Isaiah Wright, awarded the lead back to Solanco at 28-26 with the third frame careening towards its halfway point.

From that point on, Solanco never really looked back in the rearview mirror the rest of the way.

To say that Isaiah Wright had his fingerprints all over this game would be nothing if not a gross understatement. Sure, it’s easy to get lost in the sauce if you will with this ability to have the pill look like it’s on a string with the way he’s able to yo-yo and dance with it on the floor while also not accounting for his ability to finish at the cup before also recalling his propensity in pulling up and rising above defenders without so much of a thought. And yeah, while Wright would indeed flash that offensive prowess in finishing the evening as the game-high scorer in netting an 18-point effort once the dust had settled, there is simply no way the Mules would’ve been nearly as successful over 32 minutes had it not been for Wright’s work exerted on the defensive end on Thursday night. For his assignment, the Solanco junior was tasked with hounding Cooper Truskey all night long, no small chore considering the Ephrata senior sniper is now the Mounts’ program leader in terms of 3-balls sunk within a career.  To be sure, wherever Truskey went, so too did Wright. And while Wright’s aforementioned 18-point night was sensational and flashy, his work defensively was equally pretty in its own regard as for how grimy and effective it was seeing as how the Truskey was held to just a pair of trademark triples netted over the course of the game’s lifespan, again, a large chunk of credit is deserving of Wright for locking down the Mounts’ prolific scorer.

Yet speaking of flashy, it was hard to use a word anything but in describing Isaiah Wright’s soaring through the air from out high at the top of the key before finishing off a missed Solanco shot with a finish in mid-air, a key bucket which then extended the Mules’ lead out to four, 33-29, with inside of three minutes left in the third quarter.

By that point, the flood gates had opened.

Sure enough, the Mules’ salvo just continued in earnest as a pair of Nolan Wager triples sunk in successive fashion suddenly saw the Solanco lead balloon out to a 39-29 difference with just a handful of seconds left in the game’s third act.

Suffice to say, with the final batch of eight minutes getting set to commence and the Mounts trailing by a 39-31 count, the time was now if they still had something left in the tank in order to make one final go of it.

To their credit, it seemed as if things might be tilting back in their favor as ol’ reliable, Cooper Truskey, bombed in one of his two trifectas in the early going of the fourth quarter to not just keep the existing deficit of eight still intact at 43-35, but it also created a bit of momentum that could be applied against Solanco with the clock ticking down.

Case in point, the Mounts were indeed able to ride the Truskey-created jolt as a timely 5-0 run courtesy of Shellhammer suddenly sliced the Mules’ lead down to five, 45-40, with just a handful of minutes remaining.

It would not be enough to summit the hill, however.

In fact, despite their backs being somewhat up against the wall, Solanco responded with a vengeance by rattling off a crucial 6-1 burst with the game still hanging in the balance. As a result, after a pair of Noah Bailey freebies at the charity stripe, the Mules’ cushion had then exploded out to a ten-point difference, 51-41, before an easy layup at the cup courtesy of Kiran Ludgate put the Mules up by a dozen at 53-41 with inside of two minutes left to play and the eventual outcome all but inevitable.  

And from there on out, the final minutes were nothing more than a Solanco coronation of sorts as a pair of buckets cashed in by Wright and Daniel Bailey respectively helped to shut the door on this one once and for all. And once that buzzer rang out with the scoreboard reflecting what had been cemented into a decisive 62-48 Solanco win on Ephrata’s home floor, it was clear that a wild party was about to break out in whatever locker room the Golden Mules were being housed in.

Why not? Why not turn that room into a slip-n-slide by throwing water on each other in celebration? For this triumph not just marked Solanco’s first victory away from the friendly confines of their home floor this season, not just marked their first section win of the season, but it also could be far larger in size and scope beyond the borders of this season in general given how this verdict came not just away from home against a team with dreams of making it back to the postseason in some form or fashion, but it also signified remarkable growth for the manner in which Solanco was able to bounce back from a tough defeat at the hands of their most heated rival just hours prior.

To be sure, everyone who stepped onto the floor for the Mules’ collectively brought something positive with them on Thursday night in order to get this job done. Aside from seeing half a dozen Golden Mules hit the scoring column, four of which reached double figures, there was also no doubt that Isaiah Wright had largely been the straw to stir the Solanco drink on this evening and what his overall contributions meant for this game to develop and culminate the way in which it did.

“You just try your best every time you’re out on the floor,” Wright said simply following his night of yeoman’s work on both sides of the ball against Ephrata. “Sometimes, like last night (against L-S), things don’t go my way, but I just have to bounce back. When a kid makes a shot, you can’t think about it too much. You just have to get back and play. Keep that next play mentality. You have to stay after it the whole game, not get full-headed.”

Pretty remarkable stuff and mature life advice in general from someone who might not even have his driver’s license in hand yet. And to ask him, that’s a mental makeup that just comes naturally.

“Oh no. That’s locked in my head,” Wright said with a laugh when asked if he is wired to operate that way or if his coaches need to coax him into thinking in such a manner. “I don’t have a ton of experience in some areas, but that’s one I definitely have a lot of experience in for sure.”

“Hopefully we don’t get too big-headed on this win, but yeah, this feels really nice,” Wright continued. “I can’t say anything really changed before this game specifically. We did laugh a little more. Try not to get guys too tight before the game and try to keep guys loose. And it was cold in there too, so maybe just warmup a little bit extra.”

He might’ve tried to keep his teammates loose outwardly. Internally however, Isaiah Wright didn’t shy away from what this particular game meant for him and the impetus for why this game carried so much weight to him on a personal level.

“I’ve been thinking about this game for a while now,” said Wright of his team’s trip up to Ephrata on this night. “Last year, a lot of those same guys kicked our ass,” he stated in recalling a 19-point loss here on this same piece of property 12 months ago now. “We’ll celebrate this win tonight and get right back. And hopefully we earned something to eat,” he added with a smirk and a not-so subtle friendly jab at his head coach before walking out to board the victorious team bus back home.

 As for his head coach, Anthony Hall, it’s doesn’t take much to see how much Isaiah Wright means to him on a personal level. In fact, you only need to ask one question.

“In a lot of areas. On the court and off the court,” said Hall of Wright’s improvement before having to pause with his voice cracking in trying to hold back tears, if not letting some fall, in coming from a place of love and pride.

“He made huge strides during the football season,” Hall, also the Solanco athletic director, remarked of his point guard during the winter months who also plays the role of wideout and corner for the school’s team during the fall. “He volunteered to play JV at the start of the year so that he could prep for the varsity and get under the Friday night lights and get on the field. He understands the work ethic that’s needed and what it takes in order to get reps.”

“You’re basically looking at a young streetball/playground rat, who’s turned into a gym rat, who’s now become a young man,” the Mules’ coach said of his junior floor leader’s overall metamorphosis. “We’ve been waiting for this. Nolan Wagner coming back releases pressure off of (Wright) which was there for the first seven games….I wouldn’t say Isaiah’s arrived yet, but people are taking notice now that we have him.”

“I’m just so frickin’ proud of him,” Hall added without any hesitation. “The way last night unfolded at the end of the game, he carried that weight on him all day today because he had two turnovers in the last minute of the game,” the Solanco coach said rehashing the L-S contest in which the Mules had a true chance to win. “The minute we got on that bus today to come up here, he became Isaiah again rather than carrying a piano on his back. I’m super proud of him.”

Not just him, but the entire team too. That’s the bigger piece of the puzzle at work here.

“The biggest thing with rebuilding a program is the belief in doing it and then finally winning,” the Mules’ third-year coach remarked. “They’ve been on the cusp probably five- or six-times times this season in breaking through that ceiling of finishing a game,” he said of his troops. “Our motto all year has been, ‘Finish, finish, finish.’ They’re finally starting to understand that they can compete with anybody, and I think taking a district-ranked team (L-S) last night to the wire gave them proof like, ‘Holy cow. It’s clicking.’ That’s what we harped on with them after the game and before the game today. ‘It’s right there. It’s about to click. It’s right there. It’s about to click.’ The pieces are starting to come together,” said Hall. “We haven’t arrived yet, but now the skill development has become better. The team part has gotten better. It’s now just a matter of them believing in themselves that they can finish games, and they finally busted through tonight.”

But to understand this result, a game that came immediately on the heels of the Mules swallowing a bitter pill forced upon them by their fiercest of rivals, this could’ve easily gone south in Ephrata with Solanco all up in their feelings still.

“Yeah, that’s been Solanco’s MO,” Hall stated. “That’s what we’ve changed here over the last six games. It doesn’t matter what the score is. We’re going to keep battling. It’s that old saying that this world doesn’t like now. ‘When you’ve got someone in the water, you’ve got to push them under.’ Everybody’s used to doing that to us. ‘Oh, it’s just Solanco.’ Now, I’ve had a couple of coaches give me compliments in telling their own kids, ‘You’ve got to prepare for them. They’re not as bad as their record says. They’re going to bite someone sooner or later,’” he stated of conversations shared amongst fellow bench bosses regarding his team. “Our guys don’t look at the scoreboard anymore. They just play their hearts and decide that we’re going to play our game rather than you dictate yours upon us. That’s the first piece. (His players) saying, ‘Not anymore.’ They’ve taken ownership of it.”

“I think last night caught some attention, but tonight’s definitely going to catch some attention,” Hall remarked of where his team may lie in overall discussion within the L-L at this moment in time following this latest stretch of games. “But again, we’re just going to continue being us. It was our last game of section play, so we finally got the monkey off our back tonight. We got the one (win). Now, we have to go back through the section again and it’s not going to get any easier. We’re back on the road in going up to Cocalico.”

“These guys feel like there’s multiple games on the schedule that we should’ve gotten,” shared Hall of his troops. “There’s no more shoulda’s anymore. Now you gotta go out and get it. Our message has been that we have to finish games, but we have to play them one minute at a time. Stop thinking about the fourth quarter when we’re only in like the second minute of the first quarter.”

“I’m just extremely proud of them that they’re finally making other programs have to prepare for us now. That’s the ‘statement’ I’m happy about,” Hall said in closing of his club. “They deserve that.”

And after this result makes its way through the local landscape, you can be assured that Solanco will have a hard time laying in the weeds the rest of the way. For that, respect, no matter how big or small, has rightly been earned for the bunch from Quarryville.

Follow LLhoops on Twitter @LLhoops

 
 
Fifty Years of Lancaster-Lebanon League Boys Basketball
 
LL Hoops Livestream
 
 
x