Tag: Travis Retzlaff

by Mike Pavlichko

East Brunswick’s Travis Retzlaff named CJSR GMC Girls’ Basketball Coach of the Year

First came the recognition from the league’s coaches, now from everyone else.

Or at least, in this case, Central Jersey Sports Radio, which has named East Brunswick’ Travis Retzlaff its GMC Girls’ Coach of the Year for 2025-26.

The Bears had a special season, winning 23 games, its best season since Keith Lane’s squad went 22-4 a decade ago and won the GMC Tournament championship.

This year, it was a second place finish in the Red National behind St. Thomas Aquinas, and a run to the GMC finals against the Trojans, who won their seventh straight.

But with a relatively young club – their biggest loss will be top rebounder Julianna DelosSantos-Branson – and standout Ava Catanho returning for her junior year, the Lady Bears should be well poised for success the next few seasons, perhaps even the league’s best shot to dethrone the Trojans.

To see a team without a lot of veterans do what East Brunswick did, getting the most out of a young squad – and keeping them composed in big games – takes a steady and patient coach, something that fits the bill for Retzlaff.

The Lady Bears also reached the Central Jersey Group 4 semifinals, falling to Hillsborough.

Click below to listen to Central Jersey Sports Radio’s Mike Pavlichko talk with CJSR GMC Girls’ Coach of the Year Travis Retzlaff:

by Mike Pavlichko

East Brunswick earns first trip back to GMC Tourney final since they won it all in 2016, with 52-38 semifinal victory over Piscataway

The East Brunswick girls’ basketball team last won the GMC Tournament title in 2016.

Ten years later, that team could have another reason to celebrate.

That’s because the 2026-26 Lady Bears – the tournament’s second-seed are going back to the finals for the first time since, after a 52-38 win over third-seed Piscataway in the semifinals at Monroe Twp. High School Tuesday night, heard live on Central Jersey Sports Radio.

The Chiefs got the first basket of the game, but 2-0 was the only time they would lead. East Brunswick (21-4) went on a quick 9-0 run to take a seven-point lead, and though it would get closer at various points in the first half – even just 22-18 at halftime – the lead grew and shrunk, in double-digits most of the second half, but never changed hands again.

Thanks to Piscataway Township and Mayor Brian Wahler for sponsoring tonight’s game!

The Chiefs have been a team with great three-point range all year, but the shots just weren’t going in. Otherwise, it might have been a different game. Every time Piscataway would come up with a stop, or a mini-run, East Brunswick was there to counter back.

And while Piscataway – now 15-8 – has had a fine season with a starting five made up entirely of sophomores, it was another soph who was the difference for East Brunswick, as she has been the entire season.

Ava Catanho finished with a team-high 13 points for the Bears (20-4) and had one triple. Sophia Tannura had tow and finished with six points, but each seemed to come at big moments with Piscataway trying to get back in the game. Sophomore Violet Azcona of Piscataway was the game’s high scorer with 14 points.

Coming into the game, Piscataway was 17-0 when holding opponents to 54 points or less. Tuesday night was the exception, as the Bears won it with just 52 points.

Now, East Brunswick is going back to the title game in the GMC Tournament, where they’ll be back at Monroe Friday night at 6 pm against six-time defending champion and top-seed St. Thomas Aquinas, which was a 76-56 winner over fourth-seed Colonia in the nightcap semifinal. 

The Bears will be looking for their sixth GMC Tournament championship, and seventh county title overall.

Click below for postgame reaction with East Brunswick sophomore Ava Catanho and head coach Travis Retzlaff with Central Jersey Sports Radio’s Mike Pavlichko, presented by Sportsplex at Metuchen:

by Mike Pavlichko

East Brunswick, surging Piscataway to meet in GMC Tournament semis Tuesday, seeking first finals trips in a while

In the last six years that St. Thomas Aquinas has won the GMC Tournament, they have faced Monroe and Colonia twice, South Brunswick and Edison once.

And while they’re a heavy favorite to get back to the finals again this year – and win it all – there’s one certainty: they will finally face someone new if and when they get there.

Second-seed East Brunswick (20-4) and third-seed Piscataway (15-7) haven’t seen the title game in a while, but one of them will be there Friday night down at Monroe Township High School. To get there, they’ll have to win the opener of Tuesday night’s GMC Tournament semifinal doubleheader, also at Monroe.

You can hear that game live on Central Jersey Sports Radio, with Mike Pavlichko and Dylan Allen calling all the action. Coverage begins at 4:45 with the pregame show, and tip-off between the Bears and Chiefs at 5:00. Click here to listen. The game will be immediately followed by top-seed and six-time defending champ St. Thomas Aquinas playing fourth-seed Colonia at 7 pm.

East Brunswick has been fantastic all year long, in a season that has been the culmination of the vast majority of the team playing together for the last several years, even before they got to high school. They’re fast and athletic, can play “D” and shoot the three. Ava Catanho leads the team in scoring at 18.3 points per game, and has a team-high 49 treys on the year, with juniors Zoey Alexio and Sophia Tannura not far behind, with 46 and 42, respectively. They are one of the top three-point shooting teams in the state, with 188 on the year coming into the game.

Julianna DelosSantos-Branson – “JDB,” as she’s known to her teammates, is the team’s top rebounder at 8.3 per game, and also has a team-best 19 blocks and 15 steals. Sophomore Ava Krzywdzinski dishes out 5.3 assists per contest.

Thanks to Piscataway Township and Mayor Brian Wahler for sponsoring tonight’s Piscataway game!

They’ll face a Piscataway team that scores a little less – just under 54 points per game, while EB scores 59 – but can also hit from beyond the arc, with 135 on the season, led by sophomore Caelyn Cook, who has 47 treys, while leading the team in scoring at 13.5 and assists with 67. Sophomore Alyssa Iduh averages a double-double – 11.8 points and 14.1 rebounds, while also rejecting a team-best 64 shots. He has 15 double-doubles in 22 games played this season. Another sophomore, Violet Azcona, has 54 steals to lead the team, averaging 11.5 points a game.

Notice a trend here? This team is young. There are no seniors on the roster, one junior, and two freshmen. The starting lineup is all sophomores, as are their top six scorers.

East Brunswick may have a little more depth in what has been a tremendous season, the Bears’ first 20-win campaign since 2017-18. They lost in the GMC Tournament semifinals that year, and were knocked out of the state tournament in the first round. They are hoping for a better outcome this year, seeking their first finals berth since 2016, when they beat Monroe for their sixth county title overall.

Piscataway is seeking its first trip back since 2018, when they also won it, beating Edison for their 14th overall crown.

The Bears and Chiefs combined have won 17 of the 39 GMC Tournament titles, heading into this, the 40th edition. Two of Piscataway’s and one of East Brunswick’s crowns came in the old Middlesex County Tournament, before the formation of the GMC in 1985-86.

Click below for preview interviews with both head coaches:

East Brunswick head coach Travis Retzlaff with Central Jersey Sports Radio’s Mike Pavlichko
Piscataway head coach Brian Tuskan with Central Jersey Sports Radio’s Dylan Allen
by Mike Pavlichko

Huge Thursday night GMC-Skyland crossover has No. 6 East Brunswick at No. 4 Hillsborough in rematch of 2025 CJ4 quarterfinals

Last season – the only one in Travis Retzlaff’s first six seasons as head coach besides the COVID year to finish under .500 – the East Brunswick girls basketball team reached the Central Jersey Group 4 quarterfinals.

Maybe they were a little early, but this year they seem right on schedule.

With their roster mostly in tact from last year – plus the return of a standout from injury – the Bears are now ranked No. 6 in the Bellamy & Son Paving Girls’ Basketball Top Ten, and Thursday night, they’ll make the return trip back to Hillsborough to face the No. 4 Raiders, who haven’t seemed to be affected by major graduation losses at all.

You can hear that game Thursday live on Central Jersey Sports Radio, with pregame set for 5:15 and tip-off at 5:30 pm as Mike Pavlichko brings you all the action. Click here to listen.

The Raiders are 12-2 on the season, winners of six straight, a stretch in which they have held five opponents under 40 points, and two under 30.

With the school’s all-time leading scorer Cesci Schiro now at Siena – after scoring 2,106 points, more than any boy or girl in ‘Boro history – and Mya Loniewski and Regan Bice gone, those waiting in the wings have stepped up to complement key returnees like Isabella Ruh, the team’s leading scorer (11.8 ppg) and rebounder (11.9), with 26 blocks.

Nevya Loniewski – Mya’s younger sister – returns, while Alexa Gaspar is chipping in 11 points per game, and Victoria Leidl another 10.1 and a team-best 32 treys.

But it’s Ruh – who killed East Brunswick (12-3) last year with 12 points, six rebounds, and a 4-of-6 night at the free throw line in last season’s Central Jersey Group 4 quarterfinal meeting – who will be part of the key matchup to watch on the night, going up against the Bears’ Julianna DelosSantos-Branson.

“JDB,” as they call her, may give up two inches, but she’s the team’s best rebounder. She’d be a four-year varsity player except that she missed all but five minutes last season recovering from an ACL injury. She’d be rehabbing, and tried to get in an early season game, but it didn’t go well, and she missed the entire rest of the year.

Ava Catanho is the scoring star, a 5-10 sophomore averaging 17.8 points per game with a team-best 28 treys, but also ten blocks to lead the team, and 28 steals, third best among the bears.

Click below to hear Central Jersey Sports Radio’s Mike Pavlichko preview the game with both head coaches:

Hillsborough head coach Courtney Tierney
East Brunswick head coach Travis Retzlaff
by Mike Pavlichko

East Brunswick girls enter 2026 on best season start in nearly two decades, but things will heat up quickly in the New Year

As we all get set to take down the 2025 calendars and hang 2026 up on the fridge, there are just three unbeaten girls’ basketball teams left in the Greater Middlesex Conference.

Piscataway Magnet is off to a good start in the Blue National, 7-0 overall. Colonia has been a pleasant surprise in the Red National in its second season under Jill Bachonski. (We’ll see them next Tuesday, January 6th, in a girls/boys doubleheader broadcast live on CJSR.)

At East Brunswick, the Lady Bears are 6-0 heading into the New Year, and not looking back.

Granted, things will pick up in league and divisional play. Head coach Travis Retzlaff, now in his seventh season leading the program, has the girls taking that “one game at a time” mentality, and so far the results have been excellent.

They kicked off the season snapping an eight-game skid against Monroe, its first win over the Falcons since an early January victory in 2022.

They followed that with wins over North Plainfield, South Brunswick and Mount St. Mary, then took a pair of games down at the Holmdel Holiday Showcase, beating Marlboro and the host Hornets Sunday and Tuesday to enter the 2026 portion of the schedule unbeaten, and ranked fifth in the Bellamy & Son Paving Week Three Top Ten.

On the stat sheet, Sophomore guard Ava Catanho leads the way with 21 points per game and 14 treys on the season, and the rest of the lineup is pretty balanced. Junior Sophia Tannura has hit a dozen times from beyond the arc, and is averaging 11.3 points per game, while senior forward Julianna DeLosSantos-Branson is scoring at a 9.7 point per game clip, leading with 5.7 rebounds per game, seven blocks and ten steals.

But the schedule gets tougher quickly. After a Saturday home game against Piscataway and a trip across the Outerbridge to the Coaches Choice NY/NJ Staten Island Challenge, they’ll go back-to-back on the road against St. Thomas Aquinas and Monroe. Both those teams met in the GMC finals last year, and the Trojans have won five straight league titles; they’re the one everyone is chasing.

They’ll meet a rejuvenated Colonia later in the year, and even have a non-conference visit to defending state Group 4 champion Hillsborough on January 22nd, which can be heard live on CJSR.

One day at a time.

Click below to hear East Brunswick girls’ basketball coach Travis Retzlaff talk about the Lady Bears’ 6-0 start to the season with Central Jersey Sports Radio’s Mike Pavlichko:

by Mike Pavlichko

East Brunswick girls look to exact revenge for season-opening loss to No. 8 Old Bridge

To say the season opener between East Brunswick and Old Bridge was a roller coaster would be an understatement.

The Lady Bears didn’t come out of the gate like they wanted to, and found themselves down early 14-0, but clawed back to within 14-11 at the first break. Then they held the Knights to just six points in the second quarter to take a 23-20 lead. Back and forth they’d go, but ultimately Old Bridge would win it 49-47.

Thursday night, East Brunswick (9-2, 5-2 GMC Red) look to even the score when No. 8 Old Bridge (6-3, 5-2 GMC Red) comes to town for a key divisional matchup. The winner would be in sole possession of second place in the Greater Middlesex Conference Red Division, a coveted spot come county tournament seeding time.

You can hear Thursday night’s game on Central Jersey Sports Radio, beginning with pregame at 5:45 pm and tip-off at 6:00, as Mike Pavlichko and Dom Savino call all the action. Click here to listen live.

Click below to hear Mike Pavlichko talk with fourth-year East Brunswick head coach Travis Retzlaff:

This story was corrected to show Old Bridge’s record is 6-3 overall, 3-3 in division.