As the final buzzer sounded in a frigid, snowy Copeland Field House, the Milton boys basketball team fell to Needham for the second time this season in a game they never led. It wasn’t the outcome a team chasing a league title wanted, but there was a discernible difference between the Wildcats’ 14-point loss and the nearly 40-point beatdown they took two weeks earlier to the Rockets.
There was a whole lot more fight.
In reality, this group of Wildcats, specifically their 11 seniors — the biggest class since Milton’s 2009 state title team — have been fighting since the day they joined the program. They’ve lifted up a program that won five combined games their first two seasons to one that returned to the tournament in 2024 and began this season with state title aspirations.
But the program didn’t change when it showed grit against a one-loss Needham team, or even when it clinched its first tournament berth since 2020.
The program changed, maybe for good, when a group of eighth graders took the court in the Metrowest League Championship in the winter of 2022. There they sported the Milton white and red, but were still months, maybe even years away from making an impact on a high school program that was at a low point.
It was on that day that the trajectory of Milton basketball changed forever.
Milton’s Class of 2026 and many of its current 11 seniors would go on to win that eighth grade title in 2022, and set their eyes on joining a Wildcat team that was in the midst of a two-win season.
“I was on the same team as these guys that won the state championship for Metro,” senior guard Christian Louis said. “But we just knew this class was going to be the class to get over the hump. We have just been working ever since we got here.”
When November of 2022 arrived, it provided an opportunity that not many freshman classes typically receive — varsity minutes. Bryce Fletcher, Ronan Sammon and Louis were immediately listed on the varsity roster as freshmen, some filled out other levels of the program, and from there the process began.
“When they were freshmen and sophomores, the groups ahead of them might not have had a lot of basketball talent,” Milton coach Billy Donovan said. “But they also provided that, I mean, we have a standard, show up on time, practice hard, be a good teammate. So they learned that from guys that struggled. I think they’ve carried that, and it’ll kind of pass that down.”
The Class of 2026 had their fair share of struggles, too, in their rise back to basketball relevancy, but through it all there was this internal belief that they would be the ones to bring Milton back.
“Obviously, we didn’t have a lot of success back in the earlier seasons,” senior forward Billy Rhee said. “But I mean, we’ve put in the work. We’ve all been coming in, long practices, tough, tough schedules, and it’s kind of culminated this season, and we’re kind of seeing a lot more success than we have in the past.”
A one-win season as freshmen led way to a four-win campaign as sophomores with Cole Fletcher, Jack O’Brien, Billy Rhee, Patrick Mason, Dario Karanxha, CJ Conachy and Osagie Odion-Ukpebor joining the varsity roster.
With the group now fully formed on the roster, the real work could begin, and much of that is credited to the dedication the class showed to the sport of basketball itself. When the Class of 2026 initially arrived, Milton’s program didn’t necessarily have many “basketball players.” In other words, basketball wasn’t at the top of mind.
That changed rather quickly.
“(Before) freshman year, we haven’t really had, basketball players,” Sammon said. “Now we really do, we have guys who really their main sport is basketball. But ever since freshman year, we just been working, working hard at practice, showing up every day, just getting better.”
Basketball quickly became important again in Milton as the Wildcats caught fire their junior year, starting the season 6-0 before ultimately finishing 12-10. Milton clinched its first trip to the dance since 2020, defeating Bay Path before falling to Whitman-Hanson.
“It’s been pretty obvious from the start, a lot of other classes had maybe one or two guys, but our class has been a pretty heavy basketball class,” Rhee said. “From the start, a lot of players have come and shown out.”
The success has carried over into their final run, which began with lofty goals at the beginning of the season. The Wildcats sit at 9-6 entering Tuesday’s game against Walpole, one win away from another trip to the tournament and an opportunity to pursue a title they’ve had their eyes on since they joined the program.
But while a state title would be a fairytale final chapter in a story that began nearly four years ago, it won’t have any effect on how meaningful their journey has been to the program, and the people, they represent.
It’s not very often you have the opportunity to make basketball matter again at a school.
“We got here and basketball, no one really cared about us,” Louis said. “I’ll say now people come to our games, I feel like us, regardless of what we do, whether we are in the state championship, lose, no matter what this program is going to be better in the future.”
“I think we definitely revitalized the basketball spirit at the high school,” Rhee said. “Right now, we definitely have an impact, teaching the kids that are going to take our spots what’s required to keep this going.”
You don’t have to look much further than the Donovan household to see the impact that these seniors have had. The Milton head coach has five children, and two of his sons, Vincent and Cormack, are at nearly every single game and practice. Not because they’re forced to, it’s because there’s no other place they’d rather be.
“My two oldest are here all the time, and it’s probably not easy to be around me every day,” Donovan laughed. “In practice, in games, the way they all treat my boys… they never want to miss a game, home or away. They’re included by these guys. They’re treated like part of it, they’re just such good kids.”
When Vincent and Cormack Donovan are shooting around at their house, they don’t pretend to be Boston Celtics’ stars Jayson Tatum or Jaylen Brown. Instead, they pretend they’re Rhee, Louis, Sammon or the Fletcher twins.
“It pushes us to play better,” Rhee said. “And I feel like it also kind of brings a team together, it relates us with our coach more. We’re like a part of the family, we all know each other, and it just brings us together.”
Perhaps one day the Donovan boys will put on the same Milton jerseys that these seniors wear now, and they’ll remember what these 11 meant to the program, and the impact they had throughout their childhood.
And that right there is more impactful than any banner collecting dust in a gym.
