It was supposed to be Parents Night Friday at the Wayland varsity basketball home game against Forest Hills Eastern. It should have been re-titled Avery Hudson Night.
The senior point guard, playing his last regular season home basketball game over four years, made it memorable by breaking the school individual game scoring record with 53 points while he and his teammates partied to an 86-71 victory.
The Wildcats, now 16-3 for the campaign overall and tied for the No. 8 slot in the latest Associated Press state-wide rankings, will finish their regular season at Holland Tuesday night before playing host in a Class B district tournament Monday, March 6, against Hopkins.
Hudson’s performance was remarkable in many ways.
His 53 points broke a record that had stood for 54 years. Ron Kidney scored 45 points in February 1963 in a game against Nashville.
It was also remarkable because he didn’t even begin to weave his magic of three-pointers, steals and ball hawking for layups until the game was more than four minutes old.
Senior Auston Whitley started the ballgame with a three-pointer and Zack Nieuwkoop swished a pair of free throws, but the ‘Cats were down 9-5 until the 3:42 mark when Hudson nailed the first of his 11 threes in the first half alone, which also is likely a record. By intermission he had pumped in 36 points, likely another record, one more point than the entire Forest Hills team, which trailed 50-35 at the break.
Things slowed down a lot in the third quarter and Hudson seemed to have somebody following him around a lot.
It was a good thing that the senior point guard was on target so often during the contest. Senior pivot Zack Nieuwkoop, the team’s second leading scorer, was retired to the sidelines in the first quarter with two fouls and he picked up his third foul early in the third period, sending him back to the bench.
Mitchell Dykstra, Wayland’s No. 3 scorer, didn’t seem to get untracked until the very end. Both he and Nieuwkoop finished with just six points, well below their averages.
Though at times the Wildcats pulled ahead by as many as 20 points in the second half, the pesky Hawks managed to creep back to within 13 points and the ‘Cats played astonishingly sloppy defense.
Nick Hakken led Forest Hills with 18 points, Myles Olsen added 13 and freshman Solomon White had a dozen.
PHOTO: Avery Hudson scored a record 53 points in Wayland’s 86-71 over Forest Hills eastern Friday night. (Photos courtesy of Kenny Ritz)
