Basketball is in Tyler Curran’s blood.
His father, Steve, was a standout player at Merrimack College and has worked on the St. Bonaventure men’s basketball coaching staff for more than a decade. Tyler’s older brother, Casey, starred at Allegany-Limestone before him, helping the Gators to a pair of sectional champion teams, and currently plays at Alfred University.
Naturally, basketball became Tyler’s favorite sport, too.
“With my dad and everything, I’ve been around it since I was born,” he said. “Basketball is just the thing I go to whenever I need something. It’s been a way to connect with my dad, my brother, everyone; it’s always been a part of my life. It means everything to me.”
This year, it was Tyler’s turn to take the spotlight, and he ran with it to lead Allegany-Limestone’s best playoff performance in school history.
A-L went 19-8, playing its best at the right time to reach the New York State Class B semifinal in Glens Falls. The Gators ran through the Section 6 Class B2 bracket as a No. 6 seed, winning the sectional title and knocking off league rival Olean in the crossover. A-L beat Newark in the Far West Regional before finally bowing out with a loss to Ichabod Crane in the Class B semifinal in Glens Falls.
Curran was the engine for that playoff run, increasing his scoring average to 21.3 points per game (he averaged 18.2 points, 5.9 rebounds, 4.2 assists and 2.3 steals through the full season). Coach Glenn Anderson often credited Curran as his team’s best defender, and the Gators’ defense held opponents to less than 41 points per game in the playoffs.
After his impressive postseason, Curran won the Times Herald’s top prize for boys basketball players, the Charles M. Ward Award for Big 30 Player of the Year. Curran edged out one other finalist nominated by the TH’s basketball committee with a similar postseason resume, Salamanca sophomore Lucus Brown.
“I’VE PLAYED against those guys, some of them for the last four years, played with some of them, and I know the talent and the work that those guys put in,” Curran said of his fellow Big 30 All-Stars. “To be named, even with the nominees, like Lucus, I know how hard he works and he’s got more time left to get it. Those are some good shoes that we’re in here and I guess I got named to the top, which is pretty cool.”
Once Curran and his fellow seniors hit the postseason, the mantra “play every game like it’s your last” became true. Curran said he always played like it could be.
“But you never really hit that max spot until it’s actually possibly your last, and I think once I hit those playoff games I was like every day could be my last day playing high school basketball,” he said. “I think that helped me take it to the next level. Just playing for my team, I love every guy on that team, both coaches (Glenn Anderson and Pat Wight) have done so much for me the past four, five years and every day I would go out and play for everyone else.”
CURRAN, who plans to play basketball in college but is currently undecided, made mention of his coaches for working extra time and instilling confidence in him throughout the years. He even shouted out soccer coach and athletic director Jon Luce for occasionally rebounding with him in an empty gym.
“No matter when I asked Coach Anderson, whether it was early in the morning, before school or after practice, he’s got his own family but he would still stay with me and shoot no matter how long I wanted to,” Curran said. “I never really shot as well as I can, and every year Coach Wight would tell me ‘keep shooting, keep shooting, you’re the best shooter on the floor. … The ball’s in your hands, you’re going to get a bucket whenever you need to.’ I don’t have the best confidence in the world when it comes to things like that and that just put me a little bit higher and helped me get through those slumps.”
CURRAN, A-L’s first boys POY since the award’s inception in 2002, called his father one of his biggest inspirations. He admires the hard work his father does for the Bonnies without looking for credit.
“He works really hard and he doesn’t always get recognition for it because he’s not the top guy,” Curran said. “But he works hard, he works every single day, he works no matter what he gets recognized for, and he’s a big part of the team’s success. I take on that same mentality that I’ve just got to work hard and I want to see my team, whatever team I’m on, succeed. With his work ethic, I look at that and look up to him every day and think that’s how I want to work.”
Curran also cited some predecessors at A-L for shaping what kind of leader he wanted to be. His brother, bigger and stronger as more of a frontcourt player, pushed him to get better when they played one-on-one throughout the summer.
“I’ve been playing with guys like my brother and Gus (Napoleon) and Michael (Wolfgang),” he said. “Sam Flanders was a huge influence on me. When I was a freshman he was our starting point guard. I always watched Sam practice, I learned so much from (him). He led that team to a good season and looked at that and was like, ‘I’m a senior, I’ve worked hard at this my whole life, I don’t want that to end any time soon so I’m just going to keep pushing.’”
