|
| Joe Cooke shot 4-7 from three-point rane on Saturday afternoon. |
Byrons scored the first bucket of the game with 18:20 to go in the first half and a feed from classmate Patrick Panetta (Ridgefield Park, NJ/Ridgefield Park) to give the Mount and early two point advantage. The Dolphins would take their biggest lead of the afternoon with just under 15:00 left in the opening period when Cooke buried a three-pointer to put the Dolphins in front 11-6.
Polytechnic would take hold of the lead for good, at 22-21, with 8:31 left in the opening frame on a jumper from Thomas DeMarco. They would stretch the lead to nine points with a half minute left in the period when Jonathan Davis converted a lay-up to put the Fighting Blue Jays ahead 40-39.
Each team scored 18 points in the paint in the first 20:00, while Mount Saint Vincent held the advantage in points off of turnovers at 8-3 and second chance opportunities 11-9. Polytechnic’s bench outscored the Mount’s in the first half by a 14-8 margin.
Mount Saint Vincent shot .361 from the field in the half, including 3-12 from long range. The Dolphins, though, would knock down just two of their five free-throws.
Cooke led the Mount in the first half with nine points on 3-5 shooting from three-point land and 3-7 shooting overall. Byrons, Kenny Widgeon (Plainfield, NJ/The Hotchkiss School) and Dino Johnson (Amsterdam, NY) all posted four rebounds in the opening stanza.
The Fighting Blue Jays would push the lead to double-figures right out of the intermission when Jason Buckner converted to lay-up to put his team in front 42-31. The lead would never get below five points the rest of the game and Polytechnic would stretch its lead to 15 points, its largest of the afternoon, with 5:40 remaining in the tilt on a three-pointer from DeMarco.
The Dolphins fought back and cut their deficit to nine points at 82-73 when Johnson knocked down a three with just under a minute and a half left in regulation. A lay-up by Kevin Garlan (Jackson Heights, NY/Archbishop Molloy) with five seconds left would cut the deficit to 90-85. Polytechnic would turn the ball over and the Mount had two looks from three-point land but one rimmed out and the other was blocked and the Blue Jays got away with the win.
Joining Byrons and Cooke in double-figures for the Mount were Johnson with 15 points, Garlan with 13 points and Derek Charlton (Yonkers, NY/St. Raymond’s) with 10. Byrons also led the way in rebounds with nine, while Panetta posted a team high three assists. Widgeon came away with a pair of steals for the Dolphins who had a two game winning streak snapped with the loss.
The Dolphins shot .395 from the floor in the game, including .320 from three-point range. Each team pulled down 45 rebounds and the Mount defense forced 21 turnovers, which it converted into 27 points.
DeMarco led all scorers in the game with 24 points and he also led everyone with five assists. Buckner matched Byrons with a game-high nine rebounds.
The loss drops the Mount to 5-9 overall and to 2-5 within the Skyline Conference. The Dolphins will look to rebound on Tuesday night when they host Yeshiva at 8:00 p.m.
