02/12/2026
This will be the best story you read today. Karez Demory wins region player of the year. Karez was home schooled a few years before he eventually came back to Baldwin. The curriculum was a little different so he was missing a 9th grade history credit. The offered for him to do it online to avoid being a SR sitting in a class with 9th graders. He declined and decided to attend the class in person. While in class, he meets a small 9th grade homie who instantly takes a liking to Karez. Anyone will tell you that Karez is like my school son, so KD told me about his new homeboy who just happens to be in my class as well. So you have a 6’0 super athlete, Division 1 basketball signee, extremely popular SR walking and hanging with a little freshmen daily. That’s not what high school usually looks like right? On December 12th, we’re scheduled to play Cross Creek at 7:30pm. At the time, Cross Creek was #1 and we were #7 in the state. We’re sitting in 3rd block and KD tells me he’s about to go to his car. He comes back in with a shoe bag. I’m thinking he’s about to show me some new shoes because that’s our thing. We love shoes. He calls his freshman friend over and gives him the shoes and tells him Merry Christmas. He didn’t have his phone out. It wasn’t a huge presentation. It was as genuine as can be. The kid opened the shoes and gave KD the biggest hug. He probably came over and looked at them 7 more times during class. I was sitting with Coach Chastin and we both looked at each other and said “man he’s amazing.” He’s going to kill it tonight. Later that night KD scored 31 points and had 15 rebounds and led us to a victory over the #1 team in the state at the time! So player of the year is cool, but he is most definitely the region person of the year. Super proud to coach him. The school will miss him when he leaves and it has nothing to do with basketball.