After Ja'Quan Morgan gets injured in third quarter, Hempstead stays focused to top Freeport

Ja’Quan Morgan was less than a minute removed from giving Hempstead its first lead since the opening minute when disaster struck. Morgan was injured near the basket shortly after he hit a jump shot in the first minute of the second half to give Hempstead a one-point lead. He remained down on the court and his Hempstead teammates quickly realized it was a serious injury.

The game was delayed for 38 minutes as a stretcher arrived to take Morgan off the court. It was right at that moment the Hempstead players told themselves they weren’t losing this game.

“It hurt, but I knew I’d be going back out there and I had to do it for my brother,” said Ziyair Jones, who scored 16 of his 25 points in the second half of a 71-57 win for host Hempstead over Freeport in Nassau Conference AAA-I boys basketball on Monday. “I just knew I had to do it for my brother. Everyone came together, we all knew what we had to do for our brother and we got it done.”

Coach Jared Weir, who said Morgan suffered a lower leg injury and was getting X-rays Monday night, said it became clear how much this win meant to the players after seeing Morgan go down.

“Every timeout they said, ‘Let’s do it for Ja’Quan,’” Weir said. “They broke the huddle 1-2-3 Ja’Quan, so it really meant something to them. The energy that came after that, you could tell they took it a little bit personal.”

Hempstead (4-5, 2-0) trailed 30-29 at halftime before Morgan’s jumper gave Hempstead a 31-30 lead 22 seconds into the second half. Hempstead outscored Freeport, 22-9, in the third quarter as Morgan suffered the injury with 7:02 left in the period. Morgan averaged 21.3 points per game entering the contest.

“After he went down, winning became a ‘had to,’” Jones said. “We had to win it for him. It was a must, there was no losing.”

Winning for Morgan became the priority.

“That was the main focus,” said Dwayne Meadors, who also scored 25 points. “That’s our guy and our brother. We’re all family so we had to do it for each other. That’s what we play for – we play for each other.”

Jonathan Davis added eight points in the win. Jevon Saul and Shawn Broyles each had nine points for Freeport (2-5, 0-3).

“This is a really, really tight group,” Weir said. “Ja’Quan is new to the team this year but they’ve welcomed him in like a brother. When he went down, I had to stop the guys from going over to see him, we had to give Ja’Quan a little bit of space but that’s all they kept saying. They said, 'We have to win this one for Ja’Quan.”'