Friday, February 22, 2008

By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director

Freshman point guard Kevin Walker led St. Peter's Prep to its second straight upset, a 71-55 win at Emerson (UC), and a spot in Saturday's HCIAA-Coviello Division final.

UNION CITY -- Talk about a live underdog. St. Peter's Prep was the last team to qualify for the HCIAA-Coviello Division playoffs and the Marauders had to sweep their games last week and get some help just to make it into the tournament as the eighth seed. Prep got there, barely, but then was in the unique position of being the lowest seed in the tournament, but one that had already beaten the two teams that stood in the way of a trip to the county final during the regular season.

First up was top-seeded Bayonne and St. Peter’s pulled its first upset on Tuesday night to reach the semifinals where it paid a visit to Emerson (UC) for a semifinal matchup on Thursday.

“We knew we could beat [Bayonne] because we beat them the first time [we played them],” said Kevin Walker, St. Peter’s freshman point guard and a Bayonne resident. “And we had that same kind of confidence coming in here tonight.”

That confidence showed early on as St. Peter’s raced out to a big early lead in what was almost assuredly the last ever varsity basketball game at Emerson (UC) High School. Raphael Ortiz’s three-pointer with 2:22 left in the first quarter capped St. Peter’s game-opening 15-2 run.

Jairo Cruz finished with 21 points in what was likely the final home game to be played at Emerson High School in Union City.

Emerson made a game of it and eventually tied the game midway through the third quarter, but St. Peter’s Prep regained control with a 16-1 run to close the third quarter and open the fourth on the way to a 71-55 win and Saturday’s HCIAA-Coviello Division final against Union Hill, a 66-53 winner over defending champion Lincoln. The final will be played on Saturday at Dickinson High School in a 1 p.m. start.

It’s been quite a run for St. Peter’s, which limped to a 4-9 start to the season. But with two freshmen in the starting lineup and four freshmen in the rotation along with two sophomores, the Marauders have figured things out as the season has progressed.

“If we had to draw up a blueprint this is probably the way we would have drawn it up because we are playing three and four freshmen a lot of minutes,” said Mike Kelly, the former Wayne Valley and Northern Highlands head coach who is now in his second year as St. Peter’s head coach. “Everybody is so darn young that we figured we would struggle early and hopefully it would come together by the end of the year, but there was no guarantee when you are talking about freshmen and sophomores.”

Everyone chipped in during Prep’s first quarter barrage. Keith Lumpkin, the 6-7 freshman center, put back a missed shot to make it an 8-0 lead three minutes into the game and Joe Holder’s putback put Prep up 12-2 just before Ortiz’s only three points of the game finished off the Marauders’ dominating start.

JJ Hladik had some key baskets among his 14 points for Prep.

“It wasn’t our best effort, but a lot of that had to do with them. Prep is a hot team right now,” said Emerson head coach Drew Morano. “We kind of felt like we had a shot at this, but they were the better team tonight.”

Emerson began to find its legs late in the first quarter when it scored the final five points to get within 15-7 after eight minutes. And when Jairo Cruz was fouled behind the arc and made three free throws to start the second quarter, Emerson was within five points.

JJ Hladik and Holder hit three pointers to help Prep move back out in front by double digits, and Walker got a defender up in the air then stepped in and hit an 18-foot jumper to give the Marauders a 25-15 lead with 4:09 left in the second quarter, but the Bulldogs just kept chipping away.

Emerson ran off 12 of the next 16 points and Johnathan Reyes’ three-pointer from the wing off an inbounds play had the Bulldogs within 29-27. Walker’s pull-up jumper stemmed the run and put Prep up 31-27 at halftime.

Jeremy Delgado finished with 15 points for Emerson, which fell to 16-9 on the season.

The game seemed to be rolling in Emerson’s favor, especially early in the third quarter. Lumpkin was called for his fourth foul on a baseline drive by Cruz, who hit both free throws to make it a two point game. With Lumpkin on the bench, Emerson’s Sony Diaz putback a missed shot and the Bulldogs had made it all the way back. The game was tied at 37 with 4:34 to play in the third quarter.

“We had the game tied and we had their big guy on the bench,” said Morano. “We thought we were in pretty good shape, but their other guys stepped up.”

One of them was senior Nick Rabiecki, whose only field goal of the game came on a hard cut inside and off an assist for Walker. Rabiecki’s layup put his team back in front for good as it turned out as Prep rattled off 9 of the final 10 points of the third quarter to take a 46-38 lead.

Holder hit a pull up jumper to start the fourth quarter scoring, Chase Fluellen added a free throw and Hladik and Walker each finished drives to the basket as St. Peter’s took complete control at 53-38 with 5:13 to play.

The loss dropped Emerson to 16-9 on the season and left the Bulldogs one win short of a fitting end to an era in Union City. With Union Hills and Emerson combining teams for next season, they could have staged one more classic battle in the county final on Saturday.

Joe Holder and St. Peter's Prep will play Union Hill in the HCIAA final on Saturday.

Instead, barring something crazy happening in the North 2, Group 3 state sectional playoffs where the Bulldogs will visit Scotch Plains in the opening round, Thursday night marked the final varsity basketball game to be played at the school on 18th Street.

St. Peter’s Prep could not worry about the sentimentality of the moment; instead it is looking ahead to a shot at Union Hill on Saturday. And the program has come a long way already just to make it this far. Walker (22 points), Holder (18 points) and Hladik (14 points) all finished in double figures for Prep, while Cruz led Emerson with 21. Jeremy Delgado (11 points) and Abdul Ais (10 points) made it three Emerson starters in double figures.

“Early in the season when teams made a run at us we weren’t able to punch back and we have learned from that,” said Rabiecki, a senior who Kelly called a ‘Glue Guy’ of the program which has not been to the HCIAA final since 2005. “During this run that we are on at the end of the season we have just been able to take other teams best shot and hit them right back.”

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