ETHAN KASSEL
Prep2Prep Senior Editor

March 3, 2022

CONCORD, Calif. — King-Njhsanni Wilhite’s had big performances in playoff games before, but Wednesday’s performance reached new heights.

Playing on the road against a De La Salle team known for defense, the Riordan junior scored a game-high 35 points, leading the Crusaders to their first CIF Open Division win in program history, 57-52 over the Spartans.

“I just feel like whoever’s in front of me can’t really stick with me,” said Wilhite, who blew past defenders for the go-ahead layup with 1:26 remaining. “I’m just confident in myself and my work.”

A De La Salle team known for late comebacks nearly pulled off another one in Wednesday’s Northern California quarterfinal, tying the game twice in the fourth after falling behind by 11, but fifth-seeded Riordan (21-8) never gave in. Wilhite’s pair of free throws with 2:17 left put the Crusaders up 49-47 after the Spartans had tied it on a 7-0 run, and his bucket with 1:26 on the clock came 19 seconds after Johnny Semany had tied the game on a drive. Marcellus Edwards’ steal and layup with 1:10 to go put the guests up by four.

“We just didn’t want our season to end today,” said Edwards, a senior whose only points came on that layup.

Riordan’s top defender throughout the season, Edwards was at it again on Wednesday night, ensuring no individual scorer took over for fourth-seeded De La Salle (22-6). Five players scored at least seven points for the hosts, but none finished with more than 14.

On the other side, Wilhite was a one-man show. He scored eight of Riordan’s 10 in the first quarter, 13 in the third quarter and 12 in the fourth. His pair of floaters in the lane late in the third quarter gave the Crusaders their largest leads at 40-29 and 42-31, and he made four free throws in the final 20 seconds to ice the game.

“He’s just a big-time player,” Riordan head coach Joey Curtin said of Wilhite. “The big stage, the big crowd, he gets better.”

Curtin demonstrated a mix of emotions in the immediate aftermath of the win, celebrating with his team and staff but also releasing some frustration that had mounted after the seeding committee declined to give the CCS Open Division Champions a home game. Wednesday was also a night of unfinished business for a Riordan program that was less than an hour from hosting De La Salle in the 2020 state tournament when the game was postponed and ultimately canceled due to a parent of a non-basketball athlete at Riordan testing positive for COVID-19 in the early stages of the pandemic. De La Salle advanced, ultimately losing the Northern California championship to a Campolindo team that the Crusaders had beaten earlier in the season. Je’Lani Clark, a senior on that ill-fated 2020 team, serves as an assistant and motivational leader on Riordan’s staff now.

“Can we get some respect?” Curtin asked. “It seems like Riordan has to earn everything. Nothing is given to us. I told that to the guys when we got the seed.”

Between the home crowd and increasingly quick whistles in the fourth quarter, it looked like the walls were caving in on the Crusaders. De La Salle closed to seven by the end of the third quarter and trailed by just three after a pair of Alec Blair free throws with 5:56 remaining. The freshman led the Spartans with 14 points. Wilhite pulled up twice more for one-hand floaters in the lane, including one directly over De La Salle’s top defender, 6-foot-4 Javon Johnson, before the Spartans made their biggest charge, tying the game at 47 on a Billy Haggerty putback, Semany three-point play and two Jordan Webster free throws with 2:43 to go.

De La Salle never led in the second half after Riordan closed the first on a 12-2 run. The Spartans led 22-13 on an Elijah Keys layup off a screen-and-roll when Curtin called timeout with 5:15 left in the second quarter. A pair of Brendan Passanisi putbacks fueled a surge that gave the Crusaders a 23-22 lead on Achilles Woodson’s up-and-under move, and Christian Wise’s lone basket of the game gave the visitors a 25-24 halftime advantage.

“I told him, ‘just be the aggressive Brendan,’ and he was,” Curtin said of Passanisi, who opened the quarter with a 3-pointer and scored all seven of his points in the period. “There was no hesitation with his plays, and when he doesn’t hesitate, he’s a force. Tonight he was full force.”

Wilhite’s 3-pointer early in the third gave the Crusaders a 30-27 lead after the Spartans drew even on free throws by Blair and Johnson, and he was instrumental in a 10-0 run to give his team a 40-29 advantage with 2:37 left in the quarter, scoring seven points, including three free throws after getting fouled on a 3-point attempt, and assisting on a Mark Barer three.

“We turned it over in the third, and in the first run, they just got us on the glass,” first-year De La Salle head coach Marcus Schroeder said. “There’s not much margin for error in the Open Division, and we didn’t play our best. That’s the part that stings as a coach. Give them a ton of credit, they had something to do with that. We prepared for Wilhite like I can’t even tell you, and he still had 35.”

Schroeder, a DLS alum who returned to the high school ranks this season after spending 10 years on Randy Bennett’s staff at St. Mary’s, spent a full hour in the locker room with his team following the season-ending defeat.

“We had one guy who came in after his sophomore year, and eight of these guys have been here for four years,” he said. “Nowadays, there’s different guys that bounce around, but these guys have given it everything through a pandemic. It’s not an easy locker room. It’s painful right now, but you have to have perspective.”

The Spartans graduate four starters from the 2021-22 team, a group that finished second in the EBAL during the regular season and went on to win the league tournament before finishing as runners-up in the NCS Open Division. Webster (12 points), Johnson (8) and Semany played in their final game with the program on Wednesday night.

“He’s one of the best leaders I’ve ever been around. He’s best friends with every guy, which is incredible,” Schroeder said of Semany, who moved to the area for high school after spending his early years in Chicago and Minneapolis. He scored all seven of his points in the fourth quarter. “Our senior leadership was incredible, and you’re only gonna be as good as your senior leadership. He’s given us everything, and our program is better because of it.”

Blair and Billy Haggerty, who scored seven points off the bench, were the lone underclassmen to see any time for Schroeder’s team on Wednesday night.

Riordan will be making another trip to the East Bay on Saturday for a 6 p.m. tilt with top-seeded Campolindo (27-1). The Cougars handed the Crusaders a 48-31 defeat in the championship game of the Gridley Invitational on Dec. 11.

“We’re a different team. Our chemistry, our focus, our buy-in and our trust in each other is different. It’s a completely different team,” Curtin said of his team’s development in the past two-and-a-half months. “We know they’re the greatest thing since sliced bread. But I feel good.”