From four wins to a home playoff game: Saugus boys basketball team completes the climb

By Dom Nicastro

The climb didn’t happen overnight. Two years ago, the Saugus High School boys basketball team won four games. Last winter, it won seven. This season, the Sachems didn’t just inch forward — they broke through.

Saugus finished 11-9, won eight of nine games down the stretch and earned the No. 31 seed in Division 3, hosting No. 34 Lowell Catholic in a first-round state tournament game. It’s the program’s first postseason berth since 2023 — and its first home playoff game in nearly a decade.

The Peabody game that changed everything

If there was a moment that defined this team’s growth, it may have come in Peabody’s gym — without the Sachems’ leading scorer. Ryan Shea, who averaged 15 points and four assists per game this season, got sick during warmups and was sent home just as the game began.

“I kind of told the team, I was like, ‘Guys, Ryan has done his fair share for us,’” Saugus coach Joe Bertrand said. “‘Someone else is going to have to step up tonight.’”

They did. Jordan Rodriguez scored 19 points. Huey Josama added 18. Cam Conroy stepped into the point guard role. Oliver Hernandez came off the bench and “played great again,” Bertrand said. Ryan Dupuy controlled the paint.

“Everyone just played great,” Bertrand said. “I mean, there wasn’t a weak spot for us.”

Saugus won on the road — without its top scorer —against a program it hadn’t beaten in years. “I don’t know the last time we beat them. I would imagine a long time,” Bertrand said of Peabody.

That night wasn’t just a win. It was proof. The numbers tell the story.

Saugus averaged in the 50s over its first 10 games. In the second half, that climbed into the high 60s and low 70s. “Just our scoring,” Bertrand said. “Our scoring improved.”

Three-point shooting, which lagged early, came alive. Josama’s interior scoring — 12 points and eight rebounds per game — forced defenses to collapse. “I think Huey stepped up and started scoring a little bit more down low, and that created easier shots for guys,” Bertrand said. “A lot of teams are really worried about Huey down low.”

Once that balance clicked, it spread. “It was never one thing,” Bertrand said. “I think just everything kind of came together. Once they worked together, it just kind of like spread like wildfire throughout the whole team.”

The result: eight wins in nine games and two four-game winning streaks. This came after a four-game losing streak. Talk about resilience.

The senior core that grew up together

This wasn’t a sudden rise. It was layered. In 2024, this group won four games. In 2025, it won seven. In 2026, it won 11.

The four captains — Jordan Rodriguez, Ryan Shea, Huey Josama and Nathan Soroko — were sophomores taking varsity lumps two years ago. Now, they’re seniors leading a tournament team. They finished third in the NEC Lynch Division at 5-8 in conference play and secured a home playoff game.

Dupuy averaged 12 rebounds and nearly two blocks per game. Shea led in scoring and assists. Josama anchored the interior. Rodriguez and Hernandez averaged roughly two three-pointers per game, spacing the floor.

It became a team that could score, defend and adjust.

  Lowell Catholic was next — a team Bertrand said, “kind of reminds me of like Danvers in our conference.”

“They’re a solid team. They got some good guys that can shoot,” Bertrand said. “We just got to be ready to play.”

His message hasn’t changed. “Limit our turnovers, rebound and execute on offense,” Bertrand said. “And everything else will work itself out.”

If the Sachems win, old Northeastern Conference friend Salem awaits. Salem beat Saugus earlier this season.

But they’re not looking ahead. After two seasons of incremental growth, this year’s group has already done something tangible: It earned the right to play meaningful basketball at home in late February.

And as Bertrand said earlier this winter, that’s exactly where they wanted to be. “We control our own destiny.”