Baseball, Basketball
Favorite athlete: Matt Stafford
Favorite team: Phillies
Favorite memory competing in sports: Winning the league senior year
Funniest/most embarrassing thing that has happened while competing in sports: Shooting a full court shot with 10 seconds still on the clock because i thought there was less time
Music on my playlist: Strictly A-Boogie
Future plans: Go to college and make a lot of money
Words to live by: “Chicks dig the long ball.”
One goal before turning 30: Be on the show "Survivor"
One thing people don't know about me: I'm a crossword puzzle enthusiast.
By Ed Morrone
If Central Bucks East’s athletic personnel were a crossword puzzle, a sample clue might look like this:
11 Across, 10 letters: Plays basketball, baseball; Humble, mature, hard worker, soft-spoken but respected leader, always willing to do things the right way.
Give up? As it turns out, the answer is pretty straightforward if you’re a member of the Patriots’ athletic family:
Unquestionably, it’s Brett Young.
Young, a senior guard and pitcher/outfielder for East’s basketball and baseball teams, respectively, is known primarily at the school as a two-sport athlete. He has become an integral member of three straight postseason teams at East, with eyes on a fourth in the upcoming baseball season. Young also is an avid golfer and video game player, fairly standard interests for a kid his age, but it’s another of his interests that surprises, that is until you spend some time talking to him and understand it’s actually the perfect outlet for a quiet, mature, and cerebral thinker who also happens to be a fierce competitor.
Brett Young, a teenager in 2022, loves…crossword puzzles.
“Every single day I get one through an app on my phone,” Young said between laughs. “I really enjoy the challenge, and I’ve always loved puzzles. I like being able to solve and deduce my way through them until I find the right answer.”
It turns out this hobby is fitting, as Young has had to deduce and navigate his way through a handful of unforeseen challenges in his time at East: a nagging inner feeling that was telling him he never loved basketball to begin with; a global pandemic that shortened his junior basketball season while wiping out his sophomore baseball counterpart entirely; and a stress fracture in his back that stopped short a promising junior baseball campaign.
It’s been a lot to balance, but at the end of the day, Young has stayed the same Brett he’s always been, which is a big reason why coaches and teammates alike gravitate toward him and the example he sets through his actions. Known as a sharpshooter on the basketball court, Young brings much more to the table than just his deadeye marksmanship.
“His shooting is what shows up in articles, but it’s the intangibles that set Brett apart,” East head basketball coach Erik Henrysen said. “Great teammate, unselfish leader. Always willing to guard guys bigger and stronger than him. Whenever an opportunity or big moment presents itself where we need someone to step in, he has always been that guy. His best attribute is he’s able to do everything, so he leads by example.”
“Quiet, but confident,” echoed head baseball coach Kyle Dennis. “He has high expectations of himself and always knows what he’s supposed to do and where he’s supposed to be. He knows the practice plan, which sounds simple, but that shows he knows what is expected of him. Brett never wastes time standing or screwing around, because he’d rather be putting in extra work to make himself better.”
Young had a pretty solid example to follow in his own household, as his older brother, Tyler, also played for the East basketball and baseball programs and is currently a sophomore infielder at Lehigh University. Brett said he comes from a baseball family, as his father played at Penn State and as a minor-leaguer in the White Sox organization, so an intense love of baseball was never an issue. Young fell hard for the sport: first tee-ball at 4, and later at age 8 when his travel baseball team lost in the championship game, he knew he was hooked.
An affinity for basketball, however, didn’t come as naturally.
“I didn’t like basketball at all, probably not until sophomore year,” Young said. “I made jayvee as a freshman, which was exciting, but then I was told pretty much right away I wouldn’t be playing often. I sat on the bench a lot and wasn’t a big fan of that. But I stuck with it, and started on that team as a sophomore, and the entire starting lineup consisted of four of my closest friends. Once I looked at it that way, it became a lot more fun.”
Although Young’s junior season ended up being abbreviated due to COVID, he still managed to carve out an important bench role on a team that went 14-4, won the Colonial and advanced to the district semifinals. Suddenly, Young’s decision to open his heart back up to basketball paid huge dividends.
“I didn’t start, but varsity was so much more competitive, and I loved that,” he said. “We were senior heavy, so there were a lot of players to look up to and try to model my game after. It was great for me to play a role in our success, and had it been a normal year we would have made it to states.”
The Patriots again won the Colonial in Young’s senior season, although this time they bowed out in the first round of districts. Even so, being a member of this team counts as Young’s favorite sports memory. Now, not only was he a starter, but again, so were four of his best friends. Every single day, whether it was a practice or game, was a blast, and that was reflective in Young’s performance, as he earned second team all-league honors.
“We’re all such good friends off the court, so it was the same as if we were playing outside at a park,” Young said. “We all got minutes and won the league, and those are memories we’ll share forever. I’m forever grateful for having played for a basketball team that brought me closer to my best friends. It was a different aspect of the game that I really enjoyed.”
Being around an upstanding young man who was always prepared to work hard was good for Henrysen, too. Because of how close the group was off the court, they were inherently easy to coach. Not only that, but the players expressed blind faith in where Henrysen and his staff were leading them, completely buying into the entire process.
“They had a collective ‘Yes, coach,’ mindset, and fully believed in and trusted that what we were telling them would pay dividends,” Henrysen said. “It’s the type of thing you can’t always put your finger on, but when it’s working, you can always pull from that moving forward. One way we can continue to grow as a program is passing along a good example from year to year for the next class.
"Brett has done such a phenomenal job of representing the program at all times, and not just when he’s in the gym. He leads by example and demonstrates to everyone he comes into contact with how important it is to be aware and conscious that others are looking at you as a representative of your school. He’s done it last year and this year, and it’s really raised the bar, which is something I appreciate about him a lot.”
Young has also had to wait his turn on the baseball diamond, albeit for different reasons. After playing jayvee as a freshman, Young was told by Dennis that he made the team as a sophomore. Young was on his way to winning the starting centerfielder job when East’s season was canceled due to the pandemic. He got off to a solid start as a junior in both center and on the pitching mound, only to have his season end abruptly about halfway through due to a stress fracture in his back. This became a tangled emotional puzzle for Young to solve, as he was forced into the role of cheerleader while his team posted a 12-9 record, finished second in the Colonial and qualified for districts, falling in the first round.
“It stunk, because I started off the season pretty well,” Young said. “I had to sit there, watch them practice and play and just do my best to support them. I worked really hard in the offseason to get better so that I can be a big part of it this year. We have a really talented team with a lot of great players, so I want to stay healthy for the whole season. I think we can make it to states, and I hope that I can help us make it that far.”
Dennis is a big fan of Young’s style of play and has big plans for the senior this season. He plans on relying on Young and his innate ability to read balls off the bat to make the team solid defensively in center; additionally, Young will be used on the mound, likely in relief in close games since there is no moment too big for his competitive spirit. Offensively, Young will hit somewhere in the top or middle of the lineup, and Dennis likes Young’s ability to hit the ball gap to gap.
East is returning almost its entire batting lineup in 2022, not to mention a completely healthy Young.
“One of my biggest assets is I know the game well and have a pretty high baseball IQ,” Young said. “That comes with being a part of a baseball family and growing up around it. In the outfield, I’m not the fastest, but I get good reads on the ball with a pretty strong arm. I pitch to contact, so I rely on my change-up and curveball. And as a hitter, I just try to get a fastball I can hit as hard as I can. When it’s a big moment, I want the ball or bat in my hands, which just speaks to my competitive nature.”
This upcoming baseball season is likely to be the last for Young as a competitive athlete, so he wants to milk everything he can from the time he has left. He may try to play club or intramural sports in college, but as of now Young’s plans are to attend a large school with a proud athletic tradition where he can just be another student enjoying the totality of the college experience. He listed Clemson, South Carolina and Georgia as his top three schools, so even if he isn’t playing, he will still be around some extremely high-level athletics.
Young said he may major in business or economics, and expressed an ultimate desire to parlay those skills into a job in the sports industry. He’s still figuring out what comes next, and has faith that things will work out as they should so long as he keeps doing things the right way, which is something Young’s coaches have come to count on.
Dennis said it has been a treat to be around Young every day in the spring because of the smile and disposition he brings to the practice field every day. Coaching is hard, especially in a league as competitive as Suburban One, and sometimes coaches are trained to think too much about what the team is doing poorly in order to figure out how to fix these deficiencies. Being in Young’s presence has afforded Dennis the ability to stop and smell the roses and realize how lucky he is to be in the position he’s in, shaping and impacting the lives of young men.
“Brett loves coming to practice, so he’s always happy with a smile on his face,” Dennis said. “As a coach, it puts things into perspective. Maybe we lost and maybe he didn’t play well, but we’re okay, the world’s not ending. He will give me a great effort with a smile on his face whether he’s having a good or bad day, and that keeps me in check. As long as we have guys like Brett Young who are going to work hard and set an example, then I know we’re going to be okay.”
Added Henrysen: “Brett never has to talk about it, he just provides examples of how to do things on a daily basis. It’s an impact that lasts for seasons to come, because when you see a guy who always does the right thing at the right moment, it produces a trickle-down effect for other guys to live up to.”
It hasn’t always been easy in getting here, but Young wouldn’t change a thing. He is hoping to solve one final puzzle before his time at East is done, this time helping a fourth consecutive varsity team qualify for the postseason.
“Being a high school athlete brought out a new part of my life I wasn’t sure I’d enjoy, but I very much did,” he said. “For my legacy, I just want to be remembered as someone who showed my younger teammates how to work hard and what it takes to win the league. So, once I’m gone, that attitude just translates to next year, and then again the year after that, so that it just keeps going.”
