Storybook Ending: Manasquan Boys Finish Year-Long Journey to Group 2 Title

PISCATAWAY — The last time the Manasquan boys basketball team collectively set foot at Jersey Mike’s Arena prior to Sunday’s 2025 NJSIAA Group II championship game, the players cheered on their peers on the girls team, then watched in agony from the crowd as Camden captured the state championship that they, themselves, believed they had earned a chance to win.

The image of the Manasquan boys standing dead-eyed and clapping for Camden as the Panthers celebrated a state championship just three days after beating Manasquan thanks to the overturning of Griffin Linstra’s buzzer-beater that would have sent Manasquan to the state final was a lasting image of the 2024 state tournament.

On Saturday, the lasting image of Manasquan’s season was Linstra clutching the NJSIAA Group II championship trophy after completing a year-long payback tour, as well as one of the great careers in Manasquan Boys Basketball history.

In the final game of his four-year varsity career at Manasquan, Linstra posted a near triple-double with 21 points, 16 rebounds and eight assists to lead his Warriors past Madison, 67-56, to deliver Manasquan its second ever state championship — both in the last three years.

“There was only one ending to that story,” Manasquan coach Andrew Bilodeau said. “It was apropos.”

Linstra, his current teammates and past teammates would have liked to be celebrating a third straight Group II championship, but the experience of losing to Camden on an incorrect referee’s decision last year, coping with the loss and using it as fuel this year was a unique accomplishment that the Warriors embraced.

“Life’s not fair, buddy,” Bilodeau said. “But, in the grand scheme of things, God is good. Put your head down and do the right thing for the right reason and you’ll be alright. What’s the alternative? Whine and complain the rest of your life? You’ve got to find the rainbow there somewhere.”

“God sends you a lesson somehow,” Linstra said. “God had a purpose with all that. You never know what is going to happen in the future, but it’s an awesome feeling right now. I don’t know if it’s karma, but it might be. I definitely believe in that a little bit more now than before. I’m just happy for all the guys.”

“We learned we couldn’t control what happened,” senior Brandon Kunz said. “Everyone knows what happened, but we can’t control it. The only thing we could do was get it back this year.”

Once Linstra hit the game-winning shot this past Wednesday to beat Camden, 44-43, in the Group II semifinals, the stories of revenge and redemption could be written, but collecting a state championship trophy required one more win. While seemingly everyone else in Manasquan celebrated his shot to beat Camden, Linstra kept his team focused on winning one more game.

“Not with Griffin Linstra on our team,” Bilodeau said when asked if the coaching staff had to motivate the players after beating Camden. “I said it to my staff when we played a really good Rumson team in the (sectional) final: ‘Griffin’s not letting us lose.’ He may not score or put up whatever numbers, but he ain’t letting us lose. I can’t say enough about that kid.”

“I think it was hard to block out the noise with all those shots,” Linstra said of the video of his shot circulating online. “On Friday, I told myself, ‘I cannot look at that shot going in any more.’

Griffin Linstra knocks down the jumper to put Manasquan back up 12, 35-23. pic.twitter.com/n0WSVzgOTe

— Matt Manley (@Matt_Manley) March 16, 2025

“I think I’m very fortunate to be around this program for four years. I played here (at Rutgers) my sophomore year, so I was able to tell the guys that it’s not going to be easy. Caldwell two years ago was not easy, no matter what the score reflected. This game was not easy and we just had to buy in to our stuff and play Manasquan basketball.”

Manasquan led wire-to-wire on Sunday at Rutgers, with Linstra playing the role of distributor during a first quarter that ended with Manasquan leading, 15-6. Linstra dished out four of his eight assists in the first quarter, capped by a highlight-worthy play in which he stole the ball on defense, spun past one defender, beat another with a behind-the-back dribble and found classmate Matteo Chiarella for a layup as he drew the foul. Chiarella hit the ensuing free throw to put Manasquan up, 15-6.

Griffin Linstra with the steal, behind-the-back dribble and dish to Matteo Chiarella for the and-1. Manasquan leads Madison 15-6 after 1. Linstra already with 4 assists. pic.twitter.com/AYI9BtpmbF

— Matt Manley (@Matt_Manley) March 16, 2025

Linstra scored 15 of his points in the second half, with Manasquan shooting a red-hot 12-for-16 (75 percent) from the field after halftime. During the third quarter, senior Brandon Kunz hit three of his five three-pointers in the game, including two during a 13-2 run that gave the Warriors their largest lead of the game, 46-25.

Brandon Kunz has hit 5 3-pointers and Manasquan leads Madison 46-27 with 2:51 left in the 3rd. pic.twitter.com/Az68pp3iJd

— Matt Manley (@Matt_Manley) March 16, 2025

“My confidence has grown since the beginning of the season,” Kunz said. “I’m sure everybody else on the team can say the same thing. Them finding me, getting me open, everybody contributes to it. I knew defense was going to be the main thing I brought to the team and that was what I had to be really good at it. With my teammates getting me open, I just try to make the hard work we do pay off any way I can.”

Kunz finished with a career-high 15 points on 5-for-7 shooting from beyond the arc and authored another standout game on the defensive end, where he led the effort that held Madison’s top scorer — junior Gavin Randall — to 17 points on 4-for-10 shooting. Randall entered Sunday averaging 19.9 points per game this season.

“Brandon Kunz was awesome tonight,” Linstra said. “He is one of the greatest athletes to ever come through Manasquan. Five threes and the defense he played was awesome. I think everybody played their roles so well and I was really happy with the performance.”

After falling behind by nine to end the first quarter, Madison could not get closer than eight points in the first half and nine in the second. The Dodgers, however, cut Manasquan’s 21-point lead to 52-43 early in the fourth quarter and kept its fading hopes of a comeback alive by forcing four Manasquan turnovers in the final quarter.

Logan Cleveland finds Griffin Linstra for the layup. Manasquan leads 52-39 with 6:31 left. pic.twitter.com/UjWe3uruek

— Matt Manley (@Matt_Manley) March 16, 2025

Manasquan’s offense, however, delivered the necessary knockout punches, with the Warriors converting four layups and shooting 7-for-8 from the free-throw line after Madison pulled within nine in the fourth quarter. Manasquan made all five of its field-goal attempts in the fourth quarter to close the game.

Linstra and Kunz were two of four Manasquan players to reach double-figure scoring. Sophomore Rey Weinseimer scored 11 points to go with three assists and classmate Logan Cleveland chipped in 10 points and three assists in the victory. Junior Jack O’Reilly, meanwhile, added six points and 10 rebounds for Manasquan.

With Linstra and O’Reilly leading the way, Manasquan dominated Madison on the glass, 32-10, aided by a 65-percent shooting percentage for the game that gave Madison just 14 missed shots to rebound. The Warriors also owned an 8-3 edge on the offensive glass.

The Warriors boys completed a clean sweep for Manasquan basketball against Madison on Sunday. The girls team defeated the Dodgers, 47-34, for its ninth state title in the last 14 years and with the boys win, Manasquan is the first school to win an overall group title in both boys and girls basketball since University of Newark won both Group I titles in 2015-16.

“It’s a big deal to them,” Bilodeau said of the bond between the two teams. “They are very close friends. They hang out together a lot. It’s super for the kids.”

Over the last four seasons, Linstra has played in every game Manasquan has played at the varsity level and started all but one. During that time, Manasquan posted a won-loss record of 101-21, won four NJSIAA sectional championships, two Group II championships and a Shore Conference Tournament championship. Linstra finishes his career with 1,364 points and more than 1,000 rebounds and his almost-triple-double was one of several in his senior season. Linstra broke through with a triple-double in a regular-season win over Howell (25 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists) and Sunday was the fourth game in which he was within either two points or two assists of posting a triple-double.

“We have been so blessed with so many great players and he is right there at the top of the list,” Bilodeau said of Linstra. “He came in as a defensive stopper, like Brandon Kunz is right now. Ryan Frauenheim gets hurt last year and Griffin becomes our leading scorer. And then this year, we moved him to the point. He has done it all. Swiss Army knife.”

Prior to the arrival of Linstra and fellow heralded freshman Darius Adams in the 2021-22 season, Manasquan had reached just one NJSIAA state final and had not won one. Linstra and Adams helped lead Manasquan to its first state title in 2022-23 and two years later — with Adams in his second year playing at La Lumiere in Indiana and committed to the University of Connecticut — Linstra led the Warriors to their second state title during his career.

“I think Griffin is the best player I have ever played with,” Kunz said. “His basketball I.Q., finding guys open with all the attention on him and Rey. He finds me, Logan, Jack, Matteo and the other guys for open shots and we just have to make them. Everything runs through those guys.”

More than that, Linstra has been the driving force in setting a new standard of winning for a program with a proud tradition that has reached new heights over the past four years.

“They are just tough — really tough — and resilient kids,” Bilodeau said. “They just have the right attitude. I wish I could explain it. They have great team culture.”

“As a 2025 class, I just wanted to start a new standard for Manasquan basketball, if it was even possible,” Linstra said. “The new standard should be you never lose your last game as a senior and I think we did that today.

“We have a motto in my family: Winners win. My dad (Garry) is the boys soccer head coach at Wall High School and that’s just been his and how I was raised. It’s just the community. It’s what coach Bilodeau brings to the culture and I just wanted to add to that and be a part of it.”