New coach, new players at St. Joseph-Metuchen could upend top of GMC boys’ hoops

The warning shot came back in April.

That’s when Mark Taylor, a 1983 alum and later head coach of the basketball program was brought back to lead the Falcons.

Then, the transfers started rolling in. Andrew Kretkowski from Rutgers Prep, with two more years to play. Chase Pettiford, also an incoming junior, makes his way down from the now-closed Immaculate Conception in Montclair. Marcel Carra, who saw minimal action as a freshman last year playing for Taylor at St. Benedict’s. And sophomore Joel (pronounced “joe-el”) Patrick, who is from Ghana, also has joined the team.

Put them alongside last year’s top scorer – guard Alijah Murphy, who scored 12.2 points per game and had a team-best 28 treys – and swing Ryan Hilongos, who averaged 8.8 points in seven games after missing much of the season with a wrist injury, and Taylor has made quite the splash before a single game is even played.

That changes Monday night, when St. Joseph will be one of the few area teams opening the season on the first possible day, when they welcome Wesley College High School of Australia into the Maglio Gymnasium for Game One of the 2025-26 season.

For Taylor, he’s come home, to the place where he was a student, played and coached. In between his eleven-year run coaching at St. Joe’s – where he won two GMC Tournaments in six trips to the finals, as well as two NJSIAA sectional crowns and seven division championships – Taylor spent five seasons at Ridge, then another 14 with the Bees up in Newark, mentoring hundreds of Division 1 players all along the way.

At those two stops, he rebuilt, and that’s the task at hand at St. Joseph. With a proven track record, there’s little doubt he’ll do it again. The only question is, how quickly can he do it? Will it take time for this year’s group to jell, or will they come out hot, right out of the box?

We’ll know a lot more before the calendar flips to 2026.

Click below to hear “new” St. Joseph-Metuchen basketball coach Mark Taylor preview the season with Central Jersey Sports Radio’s Mike Pavlichko:

St. Joseph-Metuchen will appear on Central Jersey Sports Radio on Saturday, January 3, when the Falcons visit Piscataway for an 11:30 am tip-off.