Wednesday, January 21, 2009

By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director

Marquise McMillian's two dunks bookended Ridgefield Park's 65-63 overtime win over Fort Lee in a key BCSL-American Division matchup on Tuesday night.

FORT LEE -- Everything that Ridgefield Park and Fort Lee were playing for was about to come down to one final shot. Nothing was settled through the four periods of regulation, and it wasn't even over when Ridgefield Park was up by five points with 14 seconds left in overtime. Nope, nothing was going to be settled until Fort Lee's Amadou Bah raced down the court in transition with one last chance to win it or at least force a second overtime for the home team as the clock ticked down toward 00:00.

Did that last shot go in? Well, that is an unanswerable question because Ridgefield Park’s Warren Murphy was hustling behind the play and got in one well-timed swipe at the ball that left it rolling free toward the endline under the Fort Lee basket. There was a scrum for it and the clock expired with Nathan Lopez in control of the ball while lying on the floor and Ridgefield Park’s fans rushing it to celebrate the Scarlets’ 65-63 win in a battle of the lone remaining undefeated teams in the BCSL-American Division.

“What an unbelievable basketball game. I like [Fort Lee head coach] John [Ziemba] so much, we have become such good friends, and I feel bad for him that he lost this game because no team deserved to lose this game,” said Ridgefield Park head coach Chris Gaskin. “What a battle. What drama. What else could you ask for?”

Terral Merritt had three second quarter three pointers and finished with a game-high 25 points for Fort Lee.

The game had just about everything you could ask for; raucous cheering sections for each team, a fast start by the home team that had the gym pumping and a steal and emphatic dunk by Ridgefield Park’s Marquise McMillian that gave his team its first points.

Fort Lee led for just about the entire first half, turning its 8-0 game-opening run into a 15-11 lead after the first quarter. Ridgefield Park drew to within one point twice in the second quarter before taking its first and only lead of first half on McMillian's put back that gave the Scarlet’s a 24-23 advantage. Bah’s pull up jumper from the baseline and Terral Merritt’s rainbow three-pointer with a hand in his face restored Fort Lee’s lead and the Bridgemen were up 28-26 at the break.

Fort Lee starts four guards and with Bah, Merritt and Sandy Burgos, the Bridgemen have an advantage on the perimeter on just about every team that they play, at least in league play and against most similar sized public schools. To be able to use that advantage, however, the Bridgemen have to rebound the basketball to set up its transition game. They did that well enough in the first half, but Ridgefield Park, with its superior size, dominated the glass in the second half and it helped the Scarlets build a lead.

“This has been our problem all year, defensive rebounding,” said Fort Lee head coach John Ziemba. “If you noticed, we defensive rebounded the first four balls and we ran out [to an 8-0 lead]. We are a little quicker in transition and that is how we got the lead, but once they started hurting us on the boards we couldn’t run.”

Chris Cuecha scored a team-high 16 points as Ridgefield Park improved to 11-0 on the season.

McMillian set up Andrys Cabrera for an inside basket that forged the first tie of the second half at 28-28 and the Scarlets then scored six more points in a row to grab a 34-28 lead. Threes by Bah and Merritt, off a kick out by Burgos, got Fort Lee back even and the Bridgemen pulled back in front, 40-39, at the end of three quarters on Burgos’ two free throws.

Ridgefield Park took the lead on a conventional three-point play by Murphy. Fort Lee scored only six points in the game off the offensive glass, but two of them, a tap-in by Gary Nikolaidis, retied the score at 42 before and 8-1 run put Ridgefield Park ahead by a seemingly comfortable 50-43 scored with less than four minutes to play in the game.

The Scarlets were still up by that same margin at 54-47 with 1:44 left, but Bah hit a pull-up three-pointer the next time down the floor to get the Bridgemen right back in it. Bah then hit both ends of a one-and one and hit a pull up jumper off his own steal to tie the game at 54 with 43 seconds left in regulation.

Chris Cuecha put back his own missed shot to put RP back in front with 22 second left and the Scarlets had a chance to make it a two possession game from the free throw line with 12 seconds left, but a pair of missed free throws left Fort Lee in it and Merritt, who was fouled after grabbing an offensive rebound, made both of his free throws with five seconds left to force the overtime.

Amadou Bah scored 19 points and almost had a chance at a final shot could have tied or won the game for Fort Lee.

“We knew that they had three of the best players in the county and that they were going to keep battling the whole way,” said McMillian, one of Ridgefield Park five senior starters. “We’ve been in that situation plenty of times and we knew that the game was never over until the final seconds ticked off.”

An additional four minutes were added to the clock for the overtime and Ridgefield Park never trailed in the extra session, but it was never comfortable. David Urbay’s three-pointer with 1:02 left broke a 60-all tie and no more points were scored until McMillian’s second dunk of the game put his team up 65-60 with 14 seconds left.

Working against the Fort Lee pressure, Urbay made the mistake of leaving his feet with possession of the ball near midcourt, but he kept his cool and threw a pass into the front court that just cleared the outstretched hands of a defender. McMillian ran in behind and went in for the uncontested flush that eventually stood up as the winning points, but not without a few more seconds of drama.

Bah nailed a three on Fort Lee’s next possession to make it a two-point game with seven seconds left and two more missed Ridgefield Park free throws with six seconds to left the door open a crack for Bah as he raced down the middle of the floor only to be thwarted by Murphy’s game-ending swipe.

“It was two of the better teams battling it out and they made one extra play at the end. The kid [Murphy] came from behind and made a great hustle play, otherwise Bah probably gets to the basket or gets a pull up three,” said Ziemba. “They made one extra play, one more than we did, but it was a great game.”

David Urbay (14 points) was one of four Scarlets to finish in double figures.

The loss was the first for Fort Lee (7-4) inside the BCSL-American Division and in a tight spot when it comes to an automatic berth in the Bergen County Jamboree. The Bridgemen have to sweep their final three games before the cutoff to reach the .650 winning percentage needed for automatic entry, but an at large berth would certainly be warranted for a team that has played a rigorous independent schedule.

Merritt led Fort Lee with 25 points, including three second quarter three-pointers, while Bah added 19. Burgos, a junior who was honored before the game for becoming the sixth 1,000 point scorer at Fort Lee in Ziemba’s 18-year tenure, finished with 10 points. George Podin had four points off the bench for Fort Lee, Phil Russo had a three-pointer and Nikolaidis, who was slowed by foul trouble and eventually fouled out, accounted for FL’s other field goal.

The win kept Ridgefield Park (11-0) perfect on the season and, obviously, inside the BCSL-American Division. Four of the Scarlets’ five starters finished in double digits with Cuecha’s 16 points leading the way. McMillian, who guarded Burgos head up most of the way, finished with 15 points and Murphy and Urbay each added 14. Cabrera added six points as the Scarlets’ starting five accounted for all of their scoring.

Should Ridgefield Park stay perfect over its next three games, it will be in line for a top three seed in the Jambo maybe behind just also unbeaten Pascack Hills and three time defending champion Don Bosco Prep, although the Ironmen suffered their fourth loss of the season on Tuesday night against Kennedy.

“My opinion is that if we win out we deserve a three [seed]. Pascack Hills is very good team and if they win out with their win over St. Joe’s [last Sunday], they are ahead of us,” said Gaskin, speaking before the Bosco result was known. “I think Bosco would be the one, [Pascack] Hills a two and we deserve the No. 3.”

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