Lions top Novans
Lincoln moves into Saturday’s title game
CUMBERLAND – Warning to the rest of the R.I. Interscholastic League: Don’t irk Lincoln High junior forward Octavio Brito by delivering an elbow to the face – or, if you couldn’t help it, at the very least apologize.
A Woonsocket High defender apparently made that mistake early on during a semifinal of the 47th annual The Roadshow/Boys & Girls Club of Cumberland/Lincoln Holiday Tournament at the high school’s Wellness Center on Saturday night, and the Villa Novans paid for it dearly.
Brito exploded for 13 of his 17 first-half points with Woonsocket guarding a threepoint lead with 6:30 remaining in the opening stanza, helped manufacture a pivotal 20-5 flurry over the last 5:04 and paced the Lions to a mild 60-50 upset before at least 200 fans.
“I was mad because I got hit in the eye going up for a rebound, and (the refs) didn’t call it,” he grinned in his locker room afterward. “My knee was hurting, too, so when I didn’t get the call, that just turned me on. I flipped the switch.
“This feels great to win this,” he added. “I know a lot of kids on Woonsocket; they like to talk on Snapchat and stuff, but that’s OK because we got the ‘W.’”
All told, Brito racked up a game-high 29 points and 12 rebounds for the, but also earned six blocks. Gritty senior point guard Josh Jahnz tacked on 12 points, four boards, four assists and three steals, while classmate and “swing” Vinny Nassi contributed 11 points and five rebounds; and fellow wing Cody Anter six points, five blocks and two boards.
For the still-winless Novans (0-4), senior big man Ousmane Kourouma notched 19 points and classmate Marcus Harmon 10, but they were the lone Novans in double figures. Eric Agyemang mustered seven, junior Abou Jobe six and the senior-junior tandem of Jake Bissonnette and Jared Downing three each.
“Octavio is going to be a very special player; the kid’s just Spiderman,” Crooks said after his club improved to 2-2 overall – and solidified a berth in tonight’s championship final against Tolman.
“The kid’s just all over the place; he’s a great teammate, a happy kid and he plays with a happiness that helps him and his teammates,” he continued. “He plays with an energy that blows the mind; that’s one of the keys.”
Early on, the Novans held leads of 4-0, 6-2 and 13-9 (with 10:59 left in the initial session), though Lincoln assembled a 6-0 run – closed by Jahnz’ baseline hook – over the next 1:40 to actually take the lead for the first time at 15-13. Jobe followed with a trey to regain the 16-15 advantage, and the “visitors” held a 2017 cushion when Kourouma canned a layup with 6:30 left.
The Lions sustained their fifth turnover of the half at the 5:52 mark, but a Jahnz free throw 44 ticks later, then an Anter bomb with 4:36 left made it 21-20, LHS.
Incredibly, it never trailed again; that could have been when Brito suffered the bash to the eye, as he drained a layup off a steal, then a high-flying jam, then a fadeaway 15-footer. With 22:0 remaining before the break, Agyemang banged home one of two “freebies,” yet Brito went back to work, dropping a scoop and a three with 1:24 on the scoreboard clocks to give the Lions a 32-21 lead.
The half ended at 37-25.
“We just weren’t making our shots,” WHS mentor T.J. Ciolfi said. “We don’t have a turnover problem. We have a ‘not-making-shots’ problem. That’s it. We’re better than this.”
Thanks to a Jahnz scoop 4:06 into the second half, Lincoln actually upped its lead to 14 (45-31). Exactly 4:03 after that, when Jobe ripped his second trey, the Novans knifed the gap to 45-42, courtesy of an 11-0 surge.
When Agyemang lifted a lay-in with 4:37 remaining, they sliced it to three again at 5249, yet Brito canned a short jumper, then a 14-footer, the last with 3:42 left, to make it 56-49 and virtually seal it.
“We started taking better care of the ball,” Crooks said. “They had gotten a couple of easy buckets, also hit a couple of threes, and we turned the ball over. I just told the kids we had to spread them out. I also kept saying, ‘Be true to yourself. Be true to yourself. Just trust each other to slow things down, take good shots and treat every possession like it was gold.’
“We did that, and it feels great. On to the final.”