12/7 Most Valuable Thoughts, Part II: Oriskany/Westmoreland Boys Hoops

Westmoreland 62, Oriskany 59

Battle of Cider Street, hoops style. You hope when two rival squads take the court, it’ll be entertaining. Thankfully, this one made me happy I was using my Saturday night to watch a high school basketball game.

Westmoreland started off strong, scoring the first 5 of the game. Charged by a pair of John Gerace treys, the Bulldogs led 10-5 3 minutes into the game. Oriskany then settled down, and led by Ryan Schmadel, gripped control of the game for a little while. Schmadel, who was coming off a  47 point performance against Hamilton, scored 12 of his team’s first 13 points, including a bucket with 1:03 left in the 1^st to give Oriskany its first lead at 13-12. They held a 17-14 lead after 1 – 12 Schmadel points on 5/6 shooting. I think most coaches will take that. After a Marcus Smithling bucket made it 19-16 early in the 2^nd, Westmoreland went on a 13-1 run, including 6 points from big man Tyler Taverne (6’6”, 235). Two Gerace free throws gave Westmoreland its largest lead of the half at 33-23 with 20 seconds left in the 2^nd, but a Smithling 3 in the waning seconds brought it back to single digits. The big 2^nd quarter helped put the home Bulldogs in the drivers’ seat.

The teams came out even through the 3^rd quarter – the margin was between 5 and 11 the whole quarter. The teams traded buckets through the first 4+ minutes, with no team scoring twice in a row until a bucket from Westmoreland’s Erik Hauk followed a Gerace three to give the Bulldogs a 44-33 lead with 2:54 left in the 3^rd. Oriskany followed with a pair of baskets from Michael Wilk, their 1^st big guy off the bench who gave them 10 2^nd half points, including 8 straight in the 3^rd. The final of his 8 straight came with 1:06 left in the 3^rd, and it was followed by Shamis Lasher’s only field goal with :21.9 to go. This brought the score to 46-41, the closest it had been since 25-20 in the middle of the 2^nd. Westmoreland quickly brought the lead back up to double digits in the 4^th. An Erik Harris bucket followed by a Tony Fiorelli trey made it 51-41. With the margin still at 10, Schmadel, who was held to just 4 points in the middle quarters, started to get back on track. He more than matched his middle quarter performance, scoring 5 points in 1:04 to keep within striking distance. Though Oriskany was down 7, it still felt like a game they could come back in with 4 minutes to go. However, a big bucket from senior point guard Gerace brought it back up to 9 with 3:30 to go, and it certainly changed the feel of optimism from the Redskin side into urgency. Both teams hit a dry spell for the next 2+ minutes, with the only points coming from Schmadel & Smithling for Oriskany, who each hit a free throw, and Fiorelli for Westmoreland, who hit a pair of free throws. The Bulldog lead was still 9 with 1:12 to play after the Fiorelli free throws, but Oriskany wasn’t done. A difficult Schmadel trey brought it to 6 with 1:03 left. The Redskins forced a turnover, and Wilk scored his final bucket with :42.7 to play to cut the deficit to 4. Fiorelli hit 2 more free throws for Westmoreland, but Schmadel got fouled and hit a pair 5 seconds later, keeping the margin at 4 with :23.3 left. Oriskany used the press to force yet another turnover and got the ball back with just under 20 to go. After a timeout, they tried to run the Doc Rivers-Ray Allen special to free Schmadel up, but considering it was the 8^th time they ran it that quarter, the Bulldogs sniffed it out. Gerace stole the pass intended for Schmadel & finished at the other end to bump the lead up to 6 and put it out of reach. A Smithling three just before the buzzer gave us the 62-59 final.

#NumbersDontLie: For Westmoreland, John Gerace was their leading & most consistent scorer. He hit 4 threes on the night and finished with 20 points. Tony Fiorelli quietly had 14 for the winners, 8 coming in the 4th, and sophomore Jack Acquaviva added 10, including 8 in the first half. On the Redskin end, Ryan Schmadel finished with 27 points & 10 rebounds, despite being held to just 2 apiece in the 2^nd & 3^rd quarters. He started strong, scoring 12 in the first, and had 11 in the 4^th. Point guard Marcus Smithling finished with 16 on the night. Future looks OK for Oriskany – they’re both sophomores.

Neat-o Stat of the Night: Every bucket counts, and you have to start & finish strong. Clichés. Well, Westmoreland took that to heart tonight, at least at the start of quarters. However, Oriskany took that to heart at the end of quarters. Westmo scored the first bucket of each quarter, and if we use just the 1^st minute of each quarter, they outscored Oriskany 11-0. However, Oriskany scored the last points of each quarter, with Smithling ending 3 of them. They outscored Westmo 16-10 in the last minute of each quarter.