SILER CITY — The Chatham Charter boys basketball team knows it can’t fly under the radar anymore. Not after what the Knights did last season.
After going 27-1 in the regular season and winning the Central Tar Heel 1A Conference regular season and tournament titles, Chatham Charter entered the 1A state tournament as the No. 1 seed in the east region, but many were unsure of how strong the Knights were because of their strength of schedule. They responded by winning their first five playoff games and advancing to the state final before falling to Hayesville, 54-43, in overtime.
While a bitter taste remains from last season’s 1A championship game, Chatham Charter has started the 2022-23 season determined to get back to the biggest stage in the state once again. Heading into their Wednesday night game against East Wake Academy, the Knights were 4-0 and had outscored their opponents by an average of 50.0 points per game.
“We’re focused and hungry,” said Chatham Charter head coach Jason Messier. “The guys understand what they need to do to try to get back to the championship game, but they’re also mindful that last year, we probably surprised some teams that weren’t expecting us to be as successful as we were. The thing we hear very often is that our conference isn’t very strong and this and that, but we go about playing basketball the right way, we preach the right way, we get them to do things the right way, and I think that translates over no matter who you’re playing.”
On Monday night, the Knights defeated Falls Lake, 66-25, at home behind big games from sophomores Beau Harvey (14 points, four rebounds, four assists, seven steals) and Brennen Oldham (12 points, four rebounds, two steals). As a team, Chatham Charter shot 27-of-57 (47.4%) from the field and 3-of-10 from 3-point range.
There’s reason to believe Chatham Charter’s start to the season is sustainable. The Knights return all but one player from last year’s roster, led by a talented senior class with plenty of experience playing in big moments.
As freshmen in 2019-20, Adam Harvey, Aamir Mapp and Jackson Brown were part of a Charter team that went 33-2 overall and made it to the state semifinals. Messier believes that experience will help the Knights once they come down the closing stretch of the season. He also said the experience of playing in last year’s state final was invaluable to his players.
“Everyone knows what we have and what we do. We’re going to be getting everybody’s best shot every single night, and I think that experience being in big games is going to help us. We had three juniors and two freshmen playing at Reynolds Coliseum for the first time ever. Really, I couldn’t tell you any of them have even been to a state championship game just to watch and be in that type of environment.”
Messier said that last season, Chatham Charter played at most six or seven players in its rotation in the playoffs, but this year he expects his lineups could run nine or 10 players deep.
Regardless of who steps on the court, the Knights’ unquestioned leader in terms of production is Adam Harvey, who is closing in on 1,000 career points (877) in his time with the program. The senior wing has led his team in points and rebounds per game in each of the past two seasons, and for his career he’s averaging 16.5 points, 7.7 rebounds, 3.3 assists and 2.8 steals per game in 53 games.
So far this season, Harvey’s numbers are slightly down because he’s played few minutes — a product of Chatham Charter blowing out each of its first four opponents. But he has shown flashes of the type of player he’s capable of being, like when he scored 26 points on 12-of-18 shooting in a 71-30 win over N.C. Science & Math last Wednesday.
“One of the biggest growths we’re seeing out of him is in his leadership, continuing to grow as a leader,” Messier said. “I think a lot of the things he does, they don’t necessarily show up on the box score ... He’s always a factor because he’s always a threat in many facets of the game. His hands are phenomenal. He rebounds well and goes and gets the ball over bigger players. He’s a good ball-handler. He can shoot the three. He has all facets of the game, and all those facets have continued to expand.”
Chatham Charter plays Uwharrie Charter on the road in Asheboro Friday night and has one game next week, on Tuesday at home against Voyager Academy.
The Knights will not start conference play until Jan. 10, when they face Clover Garden School at home.
Sports Editor Jeremy Vernon can be reached at jeremy@chathamnr.com or on Twitter at @jbo_vernon.