Into the Hall: Uniontown 2002 boys basketball
Terrance Vaughns was there at the beginning of what would evolve into Uniontown’s 2001-02 WPIAL Class 4A boys basketball championship team.
“We knew back in eighth grade,” said Vaughns, who would go on to become the Red Raiders all-time scoring leader with 1,721 points, a spot he still holds today. “Harold Clay was our coach. They did this realignment where BF (Ben Franklin), Lafayette, Menallen, Franklin, all came together for middle school. We were in the first year of it.”
Uniontown’s team completely dominated.
“We had a board with a chart that showed all the different goals from eighth grade all the way to high school,” Vaughns recalled. “That was just one notch on the belt we were looking for. We knew we were going to be good but we constantly were humble enough and confident at the same time to know we’ve got talent, we’ve got ability, we need to have the discipline from the coaching and eventually it will all come together.”
The Red Raiders would defeat New Castle in the WPIAL final, 60-57, and reached the PIAA championship game for the second time in three years, falling to Harrisburg, 69-62, at Hersheypark Arena, to finish the season with a 30-2 record.
The 2002 Uniontown boys basketball team, which was led by head coach Dave Shuck, is part of the Fayette County Sports Hall of Fame Class of 2025.
Vaughns said he was “humbled and honored” when discussing the team’s impending induction on Hall of Fame co-founder George Von Benko’s Sports Line Talk Show on WMBS Radio recently. “That team was very special not just to me and those that were on that team but I think from a community perspective.
“Sometimes when you get further beyond that time of reference people tend to forget about it. To hear that we kind of have our due in something so prestigious as this was more special than you could imagine.
“There’s a lot of history in Fayette County in general. I may be a little biased here with going to Uniontown so I know the rich tradition and history of Uniontown, whether that be just specifically around high school sports, college athletes, even the professional ranks, but also recognizing you’ve got Albert Gallatin, Connellsville, you’ve got Geibel, you’ve got Laurel Highlands, you’ve got a lot of these rich traditions of just talent and athletes that have impacted the world at large.”
Wearing a Uniontown jersey was special, according to Vaughns.
“There is no shortage of pride that you take when you come from Uniontown to put that jersey on,” he said. “Whether it was mother, father, sister, brother, uncle, aunt, grandfather, grandmother, there tends to be this history and tradition of even family, whether that be the McLee family, the Winfrey family, the Thomas, the Vassars of the world, the history can go on and on and on. It was a chance to really honor those who’ve come before us that have really paved the way to put Uniontown on the map. Then we just wanted to do our best to try to continue that tradition and create our own lane and create our own space while we were there.”
Vaughns was part of a starting lineup that also included Chris Jacobs, Dierre Jenkins, David Winfrey and Carl Farrell, with key players off the bench being Kevin McLee and Brandon Duncan.
“I’ll start with the glue, and everybody who played on that team would know who I’m talking about and that was David Winfrey,” Vaughns said. “You needed someone that was selfless, that didn’t care about the glitz and the glamor, that didn’t care about whether he scored zero points or he scored about 20. At the end of the day he cared about winning. Because he didn’t have an ego it allowed other people’s strengths to really be evolved and developed over time.”
Jacobs was a natural guard who played forward for the somewhat undersized Red Raiders.
“Christian Jacobs played the big man’s spot,” Vaughns said. “He was only like 6-1, 6-2 in high school and he’s going down there and fighting through all the big-guy stuff and getting rebounds and was effective on offense and quick and could shoot the mid-range game. He was an unsung hero at times even though he would get his due with 1,000 points.”
Vaughns and Jenkins were both guards.
“I can’t say enough about Dierre who was kind of my running partner on the wing,” Vaughns said. “He was a great shooter, great tenacity.”
Jenkins accepted any challenge present before, Vaughns said, pointing out how Shuck switched him to effectively defend New Castle’s point guard in the 2002 WPIAL final.
“We always had David on the point guard,” Vaughns said. “(Dierre) he took those challenges. I think about that, I think about the state championship game where he actually brought us back into the game. Dierre could get hot with the best of them and he could play some defense. It allowed me to get open and operate, too.”
Farrell and McLee provided the muscle for the Red Raiders.
“Boo McLee, God rest his soul, he’s no longer with us,” Vaughns said. “Most people don’t understand and know this but they could’ve easily said that last year I’m going to bow out of playing basketball because they were focused on going to West Virginia and being the D-I (football) athletes. They could’ve easily said I don’t want to get hurt, but unselfishly decided to play that year. We don’t go as far as we do without both of them. Boo was a bruiser. Carl was a freakish athlete, blocking shots and dunking the ball.”
Vaughns lauded Duncan, also.
“I’ll give Brandon Duncan his credit,” he said. “Mr. instant offense, he’d come in and whether Mr. Shuck needed a 3, he needed a stop, he needed somebody to get somebody open, Brandon was very unselfish all the time.”
Shuck, who died at the age of 74 in 2015, swirled the pieces together into a juggernaut.
“I’m glad we had him,” Vaughns said. “I think about that team and the discipline we needed and instilling that kind of defensive mindset. We could score, but he knew what we needed, which was that kind of toughness mentality, that discipline to make sure we were all doing and playing our role and doing what our part was. He never let you get away from that. He had a different way of coaching than I would say maybe some do today, probably more old school. He didn’t mince words. He wasn’t scared to put you in your place.
“He instilled that defensive mindset which actually helped us become more of what our identity ended up being over the four years of high school. His coaching put us in a spot where it allowed our talents to flourish, it allowed our abilities to be maximized. He made sure that nobody was bigger than the team.”
Shuck’s assistant coaches were Rich Bierbower and Rob Kezmarsky.
“There was no lack of toughness to Mr. Bierbower,” Vaughns said. “He would challenge you. I can still hear his voice ringing in my head right now, ‘Bounce pass Mr. Vaughns.’ Always very respectful, always coaching and teaching. He was just equally as part of that run of four years.
“Then Coach K came over for that last year. I had known Coach K for years from the YMCA days and when he was coaching at AG and knew the history of what his career was as well at Laurel Highlands. I tried to chase him from the shooting ranks in the foul shot record that he had. He was a great player and helped us as well.”
Vaughns was one of the best and most clutch free throw shooters in Fayette County history but never could match Kezmarsky’s mark of sinking 52 in a row.
The record Vaughns does hold as the Red Raiders career scoring leader wasn’t one he sought.
“I don’t know that was ever a goal,” Vaughns said. “That was never a thing I shot for. Just like the rest of the team, my focus was on winning. That’s what I cared about. We could’ve all easily said we’re really good individually, I want to go to Geibel because maybe I’ll get more of a chance to shoot the ball or I want to go to Laurel Highlands, AG or whoever just because I’ll get a chance to maybe be the No. 1 guy, but we didn’t have egos. I could’ve probably shot the ball more at Uniontown, but it wasn’t about that, it was more about are we winning.”
Vaughns recalled the passionate rivalry between Uniontown and Laurel Highlands.
“I don’t know if I’ve been a part of something so intense and that’s including state championships, WPIAL championship games we’d been to, other big games we played in,” Vaughns said. “It’s kind of the Duke-North Carolina of the Fayette County world. We were always up for that game. You talk about getting on the court, we hated them. I’m not going to mince any words. There was no sugar coating it. I’m sure they hated us just as well on the court and it played out that way. It was always competitive.”
During the 2002 WPIAL playoffs the Red Raiders defeated Central Catholic, 69-61, and Mt. Lebanon, 73-52, and then faced undefeated New Castle in the final.
“It was about business at that point,” Vaughns said. “If I just go back to my freshmen year we got bounced out in the first round of the playoffs. We knew we got a taste of it. Sophomore year comes, we make it to the semifinals of the WPIALs. We had three seniors that were part of that rotation. We lost the state championship to the eventual national player of the year in Jameer Nelson and his team in Chester. It was a build. It wasn’t like one of those flashes in the pan. Third year we go to the WPIAL championship (Uniontown fell to Chartiers Valley) and I think the quarterfinals or semifinals of the state.
“We knew coming into our senior year it had to be special because we had worked all of our lives for that year, to get to that moment. And I think the playoff run was just a culmination of that. It was a straight business mission. We got to New Castle, we knew they were undefeated. Our only loss came in (Las) Vegas, so nobody in Pennsylvania had beat us at that point. We knew we were going to be in for a game. I think we let them back in that game more than we would’ve liked but at the end of the day all those three years before had led to those moments to be able to seal it at the end and hoist that trophy.”
Uniontown trailed by one point late but two free throws by Jacobs gave the Red Raiders a one-point lead and two more by Vaughns set the final score with New Castle misfiring on a 3-pointer in the final seconds.
“It was like the WPIAL championship was kind of the monkey-off-our-back moment,” Vaughns said. “We wanted Mr. Shuck, knowing that he was going to retire, to go out the right way and get the credit he deserved amongst Uniontown legendary coaches. We wanted to be remembered for not just being a really good team that couldn’t get over the hump and win anything. We had lost in games of high significance before that senior year.
“I don’t know that we fully appreciated it as much as we expected to do it that year.”
Uniontown marched through the PIAA tournament, blowing out New Castle in the western final, to reach the final in Hershey but fell to a bigger, more athletic Harrisburg squad.
“That game is probably the biggest regret of my high school career personally,” Vaughns said. “I felt like that was the year of destiny for us. That was the culmination game that led to everything we had worked for collectively and what we had sacrificed individually to make that team great.
“We were up 10 at halftime, playing the way we wanted to play, our speed, our pace, our game, and then we got in a little bit of foul trouble, they went on a little bit of a run, Dierre brought us back but we just didn’t have enough firepower to finish.”
Hall of Fame festivities will be held on June 20 beginning with the annual golf outing at 8:30 a.m. followed by the luncheon and inductions at Pleasant Valley Golf Club in Connellsville. Golfers can register and luncheon tickets can be purchased by contacting Katie Propes by phone (724-415-2211) or email (kpropes@occluss.com).