The Manchester Essex boys’ basketball team was able to form an identity pretty early on this winter, helping the team jump to the top of the Cape Ann League in 2024-25.
In mid-December, the Hornets were in the midst of an early, non-conference slate featuring some top-level competition, and a close victory over North Reading served as a splash of cold water to the face for the team.
“We squeaked out a victory versus North Reading in game two, and it was an eye-opener that if we don’t start to play together as a team and do things right, it was going to be a long season,” explains Manchester Essex boys basketball coach Tim St. Laurent. “From that point on, we were locked in. We went into Rockport and got a nice, convincing victory, then came home and beat Milbury by 10 and really worked together.”
That ability to come together and form a cohesive whole has helped the Hornets amass a 9-1 record in the Cape Ann League and an 11-3 record overall, good enough for a seventh-place ranking in the MIAA Div. 4 Power Rankings.
While last week’s overtime loss to CAL Baker rival Hamilton-Wenham complicated things a bit, Manchester Essex is firmly in the mix with fellow conference heavyweights Georgetown and Hamilton-Wenham for the division crown.
“We lost our first league game on Friday night in overtime, and that snapped a 40-game winning streak in the league and an 8-game winning streak, but we’re still 9-1 in the league and in first place going into [Pentucket],” says St. Laurent. “Hamilton-Wenham, Georgetown and us, we’re all in a tight race, and we’ve played all of our non-league games.”
After Pentucket on January 28, the Hornets close out the season with a home game against Rockport on January 31, followed by crucial away games against Newburyport (February 3) and Georgetown (February 6), and a pair of home finales versus Ipswich and Amesbury after that.
“Newburyport is undefeated in the league and has one loss on the year, and we beat them the last three times we played them, so they are going to want us bad,” says St. Laurent. “Georgetown is one of our big rivalry games. But first, we’ve got to get Pentucket.”
While this team picked up the formula for success pretty early on this season, it helps a great deal that there’s talent and depth up and down the lineup. Junior Johnny Chareas is averaging an impressive 15 points and 7 rebounds per game, while sophomore sensations Graham Lewis (10.7 ppg, 3.5 assists per game) and Alex Ste. Marie (11.3 ppg, 4 rpg) have been fantastic at guard and center, respectively. Jake Zschau is one of the returning starters from last year and leads the team in scoring with 16 ppg from the guard spot.
Zach Hurd and Milo Zeltzer continue to be the team’s lockdown defenders and “glue guys,” according to the coach,
while Chareas can be counted on to hit crucial buckets in crunch time. Jacob Zachareas and Ben Jacobsen are two key pieces off the bench who have looked good this winter as well.
“I think you can look at it as two sophomores who stepped into humongous roles and had to learn how to play with the team, and with the returning varsity players who already knew the system,” explains St. Laurent. “We had a lot of returning players, but everyone’s role had changed. We had to learn early on how we were going to play together as a team, and at this point of the season I couldn’t be happier with where they are and how hard they worked to get to where we need to be.”
