MJC men’s basketball is having a record season led by perhaps California’s busiest coach
Brice Fantazia might be the busiest head coach in California basketball.
He’s leading the Modesto Junior College men’s basketball team to its best season in over 30 years, leading the Modesto Christian boys basketball team to a perfect 12-0 Tri-City Athletic League title and handling athletic director responsibilities.
The Modesto Christian Crusaders on Wednesday sealed their third straight outright undefeated Tri-City Athletic League title and are unbeaten against Sac-Joaquin Section opponents this season.
On Thursday, it was the Pirates’ turn.
Led by 21 points from Malachi Miller (Central Catholic) and Daniel Huerta (St. Mary’s), the Crusaders beat American River College 115-78, locking up at least a share of the Big 8 Conference title. It is their first conference title since 1990-91 when they went 8-0 in the Central Valley Conference.
It’s all in a day’s work for Fantazia. And those days are packed.
At 8 a.m., it’s Modesto Christian athletic director duties. At noon, it’s off to MJC for practice. He gets there for players’ pre-practice shooting before they’re all on the court for the 12:45-to-2:30 p.m. practice. He’s there for the post-practice film session or workout, then it’s back to Modesto Christian for practice. He goes home after that, only to leave the house again to watch his son or daughter at their sports game. His day ends with more film and stats before bed.
“Not a lot of free time, so I’ve got to find somewhere to take my wife after the season. She’s been amazing,” Fantazia said.
He heard the outside noise. A lot of people questioned whether he could do it. It took him back to his days as an athlete.
Fantazia helped the Crusaders win a state title in 2004 as a player, played college ball at Culver-Stockton in Missouri and then professionally overseas. Accepting challenges is what he’s always done.
“To be honest, when I decided to do both, there was a part of me who even doubted myself, like, ‘Man, am I really about to pull this off?’” he said. “But I knew there was a lot of other people who didn’t think I could pull it off. … It was just part of trying to prove people wrong. I wake up, do everything to the best of my ability no matter what it is.”
He knows he couldn’t do it by himself, though. He credits both coaching staffs with picking up the pieces, starting practices, adapting when there is a schedule conflict and being there for him through the outside noise.
Greg Rosenbaum, John Ebster, Kevin Bonner and Les Bonsu help lead the Pirates. Chris Teevan, Rosenbaum, Shane Lewis and Cameron Brown have worked with the Crusaders.
“Both of my staffs have been awesome this year,” Fantazia said.
Recruit vs. attract
The Modesto Christian basketball program attracts talent. At MJC, Fantazia had to recruit.
This year, some of the best local high school talent from the past few seasons came back to help rebuild the MJC program.
Modesto Bee All-District players came back: Modesto Christian graduate Prince Oseya returned from NCAA Division II University of Mary, Miller came back from NCAA Division III University of Redlands, and Kobe Nunes, who played his senior season at Gregori, came back to the area from Vanguard University in Southern California. Those are just a few.
Out-of-area players joined. Starting point guard Tyler Rattler hails from Sacramento-area powerhouse Sheldon, Marc Mbayo is from IMG Academy in Florida, Huerta and Ylan Esso from France are all key contributors for this year’s outfit.
“It was fun telling kids our vision, what we saw for the program and what we thought it could be,” Fantazia said. “Our No. 1 goal isn’t to win basketball games, our No. 1 goal is to get exposure, push kids out to the highest level they want to go to. I tell kids all the time, I want kids that want to play professional basketball. Those kids will be in the gym and want to be pushed by coaches.”
The result has been one of the biggest turnarounds in all of California JUCO basketball. After going 4-24 last season, this year’s team won four of its first five games. The Pirates are 23-3 and 14-0 in Big 8 Conference play.
MJC has been a top 10 team in the CCCMBCA rankings all season and currently is ranked No. 7 in California and No. 5 team in NorCal.
“I’d be lying if I said I knew we’d (have this league record). It’s hard to win basketball games. But I was confident we could turn this around,” Fantazia said. “We didn’t shy away from the fact that we want to be a state title contender and a Big 8 contender in year one.”
The Pirates’ next home game is the last of the regular season. On Tuesday, the women’s team tips off at 5:30 and the men’s at 7:30 p.m. against Santa Rosa JC. A win for the men’s team secures the first outright Big 8 conference title in program history. There is free admission for all and donations will be collected to help victims of the Southern California wildfires. It will also be youth night and all youth are encouraged to wear their team uniform.
MJC closes out conference play on the road against Diablo Valley College on Friday, Feb. 21.
Pirates have goals
Night in and night out, the Pirates have well-rounded scoring outputs that feature multiple double-digit scorers. Thursday, in addition to Miller and Huerta’s 21 points, Esso added 15, Amare Suggs had 14, Oseya 12, Nunes 11 and Rattler 10.
They are 11-0 at home on the season and outperform their opponents in nearly every stat both in nonconference and conference play. They average 83.5 points per game and shoot 47.3% overall as a team and 74.6% from the free-throw line.
Those are just a few of the many reasons MJC has already won more games than in its last three seasons combined.
The Pirates’ two most dynamic players already are gaining college interest. Esso, a 6-foot-8 freshman guard who averages 15 points, eight rebounds, 1.2 steals and 1.3 blocks a game, has received offers from UC Davis, San Jose State and UC Santa Barbara. Miller averages a team-high 16.7 points and adds 5.7 rebounds a game. He has an offer from Stanislaus State.
“Those two, I give a lot of credit because they’re two of the leading scorers in the league and there’s no animosity between them,” Fantazia said. “They root for each other. When your two leading scorers just care about winning, it makes my job easier.”
Fantazia says the Pirates’ goal is an Elite 8 appearance. If they reach the Elite 8 of the Northern California playoffs, it will be the first time since 1999-2000, per MJC Athletics archives. The Pirates also made it in 1981.
The Pirates’ most recent postseason success includes trips to the NorCal Regionals round of 16 in 2002-03, 2011-12 and 2017-18.
“We just want to play as well as we can and peak going into playoffs,” Fantazia said. “We don’t really talk about it now. We talked about it before the season and the guys know what it is. Now, it’s about the process.”
This story was originally published February 14, 2025 at 12:31 PM.
