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The 6-foot-4 senior wing had a game-high 32 points, 10 rebounds and five steals to lift the Knights to a 76-65 victory over Thomas Jefferson of Brooklyn in the first game of the doubleheader at NYU's Coles Center.

Mount Vernon (9-2) will meet St. Raymonds of The Bronx (10-5) in Saturday's title game at 8 p.m. on SNY.

"At the end of the game, [Wright] was the best player on the court," Jefferson coach Lawrence Pollard said. "He was the best player on the court."

St. John's head coach Norm Roberts, Manhattan head coach Barry Rohrssen and assistants from Fordham, Providence and Central Florida were on hand to watch Wright and a slew of talented younger players on both teams.

Mount Vernon trailed 51-41 late in the third period, but Wright triggered a game-changing 23-6 spurt that put the Knights up 64-57 midway through the final period. He scored 14 points in the run by aggressively driving to the basket and scoring on a variety of hesitation moves and shots in the paint.

When Mount Vernon outscored Jefferson 30-14 in the final period, Wright scored 13 points.

"We started playing Mount Vernon basketball with the defense and that just caused the whole run," Wright said.

Mount Vernon coach Bob Cimmino joked that the game-changing defense was a super-amoeba-type defense that has never been diagrammed before.

He added: "We played harder and the fellas started to fast-break a little more."

Jefferson closed to within 64-62 on a pair of free throws by senior guard Keith Spellman, but Wright dished to Jordan Lessane, who buried a 3-pointer from the right side to make it 67-62.

"I saw him open, I kicked him the ball, I trusted him and he made the shot," Wright said.

After Spellman scored again to make it 67-64, another Mount Vernon guard, Sean Harris, scored on a leaner in the paint to push it to 69-64.

The Knights closed the game on a 9-1 spurt.

Jabarie Hinds added 14 points for Mount Vernon and Lessane scored 13. Vaughn Allen tallied 6 points and 11 rebounds.

Sophomore point guard Davontay Grace, who has strong interest from St. Johns, Rutgers and several other Big East programs, led Jefferson with 17 points and Spellman scored 16. Junior forward Joel Air Jamaica Wright, who has offers from St. Johns, Fordham, Providence and West Virginia but was playing with a touch of the flu, had seven points and 11 rebounds.

Pollard wasn't happy with his teams effort. Instead of playing in the championship, his team will face Brooklyn rival Boys & Girls for a third time this year. Jefferson won the first two.

"That's a disappointing loss," Pollard said. "I'm not going to sleep well tonight. It seems like when we have success and were doing things right and its working, we go away from it."

Wright, who lists South Carolina and Oklahoma State as his college leaders at this point, hopes to win the championship on Saturday.

"I'm excited," he said. "We have to come out and play even harder [Saturday]."