Dave Rogers
The tides of change around the Port Arthur school district are apparently breaking both ways now and nowhere has that sea change been felt more for the better than with Memorial High’s boys’ basketball team.
Among the new students checking in for this school year are Charles Wise and Chris Mayfield, two seniors who started last year for Nederland High’s basketball team and earned second-team all-district honors in 20-4A.
The 6-foot-4 Mayfield was the leading scorer and one of the top rebounders last season for Nederland, which went 9-20 overall and finished last in the seven-team league.
Wise, a 6-1 point guard, was a whiz at dishing out assists and wasn’t far behind Mayfield on the scoring charts.
“They registered for school. That’s about it,” Titans rookie basketball coach Terrul Henderson said of the pair Monday. “They’re students at our school.”
Memorial High’s most celebrated newcomer this school year is TAPPS all-state guard J’Covan Brown, a Port Arthur native who is ranked as the nation’s 26th best junior by rivals.com after playing the last two years at Beaumont Kelly.
Add the fact that returning Memorial starter Jacovin Buckner is indeed returning – he had enrolled at Kelly, but didn’t go through with the transfer – and Henderson is on a pretty good roll since he landed the job July 27.
Meanwhile, incoming Nederland High coach Brian English sounded Monday like he was still stunned from the body-blow he took almost two weeks ago.
“They (Wise and Mayfield) played with us all summer,” English said, referring to the Bulldogs’ summer-league team. “They didn’t miss an open gym, they were real excited about the year. We went to a tournament in Lake Charles right before school started. We actually played Memorial (at the Aug. 4-6 tourney) and beat them by 21 points.
“The next week, they were up and fixing to leave. I don’t know what’s going on.”
English said he met with Wise’s parents.
“They said for financial reasons, they had to move back to Port Arthur,” the coach said. “I never met the Mayfields, but from what I understand, both of them had to move back.
“I’m not going to comment any farther than I have, but you might have an idea what’s going on. The kids want to come back here, but I think the parents want them to move back there. So that’s not good news.”
Both Wise and Mayfield transferred from Port Arthur to Nederland last summer.
Dominique Keller, the star of Memorial’s team that finished 18-13, fourth place in 22-5A and one game out of the playoffs, said last winter that one or both of the players would have started for the Titans had they not transferred. Both would have made Memorial a better team, he said.
Wise’s father, Shad Wise, has been a teacher at Memorial High and coach of the Port Arthur Spurs, a summer AAU team that counts Wise, Mayfield and Buckner among its players.
Henderson, a former Lincoln High coach who was very familiar with Brown’s family from his earlier days in Port Arthur, said, “I didn’t know them,” when asked if he had any prior relationship with the families of Wise and Mayfield.
“I wouldn’t say I had anything to do with it,” he said of the players’ transfer.
“I don’t think it’s that big of a story. We’ve got a lot of kids out there. I was up in the (school) office today and there were four kids checking in. Kids are coming to the school from everywhere. And there are kids checking out, too.”
Asked about his good fortune in apparently reversing the flow of talented basketball players away from Port Arthur, Henderson deflected the credit.
“Maybe it’s you guys,” the coach told a reporter for The News, “that are doing all the marketing.”
