Orange Men’s Basketball

On Friday, the Orange men’s basketball team had the official start of basketball season with the Season Tip-Off Celebration at Panther Gymnasium. It included a slam dunk competition, which was won by senior Joey McMullin. Interestingly, there were more converted dunks during the men’s 15-minute scrimmage than there was during the actual slam dunk contest. The event also featured a three-point shootout. The men’s contest was captured by Jerec Thompson, who drained 16 3-pointers in a 1-minute span. The women’s basketball 3-point shootout was won by Aaliyah Harris. The Orange men and women will start their respective seasons on Friday, November 21 at Northern Guilford. The women will start at 6 against the Nighthawks.  The men’s game will follow 15 minutes afterward. The Orange men and women will have its home opener on Tuesday, December 3 against Granville Central. Once again, the women will start at 6 and the men’s game will follow. 

With basketball season only two weeks away, the Orange men’s and women’s basketball teams won’t wait until the season-opener against Northern Guilford to ring in the new year.

Instead, they’re starting things in grand fashion on Friday afternoon.

The first-ever Panther Hoops Tip-Off Celebration is scheduled for Friday afternoon at 4:15 inside Orange High Gymnasium. The brainchild of Orange men’s basketball coach Derryl Britt, the event will include a grand introduction for the men’s and women’s players that will start the season at Northern Guilford on November 22 in Greensboro.

The event will include a 3-point shooting challenge, a dunk exhibition, and an Orange-White intersquad scrimmage. Each of the players for the 2019-20 season will be introduced with music and fanfare. Cost for the event is $3 for students and $5 for non-students.

The tipoff will take place just before the Orange football team’s Senior Night game against Chapel Hill at nearby Auman Stadium.

The Tip-Off Celebration will also include a cheerleading and dance presentation at 4:30. There will also be a drumlins presentation. The women’s team will be introduced at 4:45.

The Orange High women, which finished 2nd in the Big 8 Conference last season, are coached by B.J. Condron. They will look to replace co-Big 8 Player of the Year Icez Barnett, who now plays at Division II Chowan University. Orange also lost guard Lauren Cates, who led the team in scoring last season. Cates now plays at Wake Tech.

“It’s Coach Britt’s idea,” Condron said. “He’s been very persistent about it. He’s worked very hard to get it going and I think it will be a great way to introduce our team to the community this season. I’m looking forward to it.”

The men’s team will be introduced at 4:50. Britt, now in his second season, returns senior Joey McMullin, who started on Orange’s 2015-16 Big 8 Conference regular season championship team that reached the state quarterfinals. Jason Franklin, now on his third year on the varsity team, provides valuable backcourt scoring for the Panthers after being a regular starter last season.

Among the other events at the Tip-Off Celebration will be a relay race at 5:00. There will be a women’s 3-point shootout at 5:15, following by a men’s 3-point shootout at 5:30.

The women’s team will have a scrimmage starting at 6, following by a men’s scrimmage at 6:20. The event will wrap-up at 6:40 to give fans and students plenty of time to walk over to the football stadium to watch the final home football game of the season.

After starting the season against Northern Guilford, the Orange men and women will have its home opener against Granville Central on December 3. Granville Central is coached by Mike McDaniel, a former All-PAC-6 Conference linebacker at Orange who also was once a defensive coordinator for the Panther football team. It will be a rematch of an emotional Orange win over GCHS in front of a packed and heated gymnasium.

The Orange men will have an endowment game against Southern Lee on December 5, which will not include a women’s game. The Orange women will travel to Southern Alamance on December 6.

The all-time winningest men’s basketball coach in Orange High School history is back in the Big 8 Conference.

Ironically, it’s now with the school that was once considered his biggest rival.

Greg Motley has been named the new head coach at Southern Durham High School. He started in his new role Thursday morning.

Motley replaces David Noel, the former UNC star who was a member of the 2005 National Championship team. Noel left after one season at his alma mater to join the Capital City Go-Go of the NBA Gatorade League as an assistant coach.

Motley remained a teacher at Orange even after stepping down as head men’s basketball coach at the end of the 2017-18 season, when he was replaced by Derryl Britt. Motley was also a frequent attendee at Orange games last season.

Motley joined Orange as an assistant coach and head JV coach under Frank Meadows in 1993-94. After Meadows stepped down at the end of the 1996-97 season, Motley inherited a program that had stood in the shadow of its neighbors to the south, Chapel Hill and East Chapel Hill, for ages.

As East and Chapel Hill claimed state championships in 1997 and 1987, respectively, Orange had a winless season in 1988. They went over a decade without a winning season.

In Motley’s first year, Orange went to the 3rd round of the 4A state playoffs when they defeated Lee County in Hillsborough.

The years of 2013-2017 were Motley’s most successful. Under his watch, Orange went 83-30. In 2014, Orange played for the 3A Eastern Regional Championship, where they lost to Wilson Hunt 66-60 at Crown Coliseum in Fayetteville. It is the closest Orange has come to winning a state title since earning the 3A State Championship in 1968.

In 2016, Orange won the Big 8 Tournament Championship after beating Southern Durham at Chapel Hill High School. It was Orange’s first postseason tournament championship since the early 1980s.

The following year was, arguably, Motley’s best team. The Panthers went 23-7. They defeated Eastern Guilford to win the Eastern Guilford Holiday Tournament Championship, despite trailing 18-2 early. The Panthers won the Big 8 regular season championship behind the play of 6-8 guard Connor Crabtree and center Logan Vosburg. Crabtree hit a running one-hander with two seconds remaining to beat Southern 80-79 on January 27 in Hillsborough to all but sew up the regular season title.

While Southern beat Orange 87-75 for the Big 8 Tournament Championship, the Panthers appeared to be the team to beat in the 3A state playoffs. They rolled past Grey’s Creek and Southern Guilford. In the third round, the Panthers stormed out to a 28-2 lead against Triton in what resembled a highlight mixtape instead of a basketball game during the first quarter. Then Crabtree tore a ligament in his right ankle going up for a rebound, ending his Orange career.

Orange still defeated the Hawks 67-47, but the offense worked through Crabtree. Without him, Northern Guilford defeated the Panthers 56-48 in the state quarterfinals two nights later in Hillsborough.

Motley resigned after the 2017-18 season, where Orange finished 9-16.

Last season, Motley remained in basketball at Mount Zion Christian Academy as a postgraduate coach. He was joined by his former staff at Orange.

Motley will inherit a Southern team that went 20-7 in 2018-19. Last year, the Spartans reached the Big 8 Tournament Championship game, where they lost to Hillside 71-69. Northwood upset the Spartans in the opening round of the 3A State Playoffs.

With Hillside now in the 4A Triangle 8 Conference, Southern may be the Big 8 favorites. They return All-Conference performer Ahmad Hamilton and junior guard Aaron Hall.

Even after stepping down as basketball coach, Motley stayed close with his former players through difficult times. Motley coached current Orange kicker, quarterback and forward Nigel Slanker since fourth grade. Slanker was diagnosed with a baseball-sized brain tumor in the summer of 2018, leaving him unable to walk for several weeks. Motley remained in daily contact with him through texts, phone calls and personal visits.