Rick Perez on the Red Knights: ‘We’re lacking hunger’

Defending a state championship isn’t so easy after all, even if you bring back most of the key players.

Reading High is finding that out.

Red Knights coach Rick Perez has been telling his guys all season that they’re now the hunted, not the hunter. It’s been a difficult mental transition.

“We have three losses, and in each case the other team stormed the floor,” Perez said. “That shows you the amount of hunger that people are playing against you with. You have to come with that urgency, also.”

Muhlenberg showed that last week, digging out of late 10-point hole to score a 63-61 win over the Red Knights.

Now, eight days later, the two meet again, Wednesday in the back end of a Berks Conference semifinal doubleheader at Santander Arena. Berks Catholic and Exeter open the show at 6.

The fourth-seeded Muhls (18-5) exposed some things against the top-seeded Red Knights (20-3). That should come as no surprise. Other than Perez no one knows this Reading program and its players better than Muhlenberg coach Matt Flowers, who spent the last 10 years as Perez’s top assistant.

He and Perez grew up together, were football and basketball teammates at Muhlenberg and have taken this basketball journey side by side.

“If anybody knows how to push our buttons, Matt does,” Perez said.

The Muhls seemed to push all the right buttons in that win. They got the Red Knights out of their game and forced some uncharacteristic mistakes, things a playoff savvy team with experienced leaders such as Ruben Rodriguez and Daniel Alcantara normally doesn’t do at crunch time.

“Their culture, it showed down the stretch, and ours didn’t,” Perez said. “We spent a lot of time arguing calls, not huddling (together during breaks), spending time on things that weren’t worth our time. We lost our grip.

“That type of environment is what we play in all the time and I don’t think we handled ourselves the right way.”

The question now: Can the Muhls do it again? Or did that loss serve to jolt the Red Knights enough that they’ll use it as fuel for the remainder of the playoffs?

Over the last eight years only Wilson, in 2020, was able to beat Reading High in back-to-back meetings. If Muhlenberg can do it Flowers will likely earn Coach of the Year honors and his top player, Edwin Suarez, will be Player of the Year.

Suarez was relentless in that first game, with 21 points and 16 rebounds. He put the Muhls on his back, which he’s done a lot of lately.

“Flowers threw the kitchen sink at us,” Perez said. “He had our kids thinking a lot with the many different (defensive) looks they threw at us. He’s the first one to challenge us in that manner. They made all the little plays and made all the adjustments, and we didn’t.”

The Red Knights opened the season playing at a high level. They beat Philly powerhouse Imhotep Charter in the season opener and routed La Salle College in mid December. Shortly after discipline problems within the program emerged. Alcantara and two others were essentially suspended for several weeks. They returned a month ago and were on the floor for big wins against Vertical Academy and Archbishop Wood.

Still, the Red Knights have not consistently played at the high level they achieved in December. Perez continues to push to get back there.

“I wish I could just coach a team that we didn’t need those type of lessons,” he said of the loss to Muhlenberg, “but the reality is everybody needs a wake-up call. Our guys are playing basketball like they’re privileged; they’re lacking hunger.

“If you’re gonna be great, that comes with a lot of responsibilities, and you have to own those responsibilities. We haven’t owned that yet.”