The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
PATRIOTS WIN 14TH GAME IN A ROW
Open Door defeats Firelands on their senior night
It was raining 3-pointers in South Amherst, as Firelands and Open Door each made eight apiece. Unfortunately for the Falcons it was not enough on their senior night, as they fell to the red-hot Patriots, 77-61. Open Door (15-2) has won 14 in a row. The Patriots opened the game with six points out of the gate, as senior Jared Bublinec knocked two 3s in less than a minute. Bublinec scored nine points in the first quarter, and a game-high 24 overall, including going 5-of-8 from behind the arc. “I think I was just having open shots and my teammates were finding me,” Bublinec said. “We were doing some really good plays, and my teammates were helping me get those open shots and I was able to hit them tonight.”
Firelands did not hold the lead at any point in the game despite having two players score in double digits. “We’re young, and we’re playing senior-laden teams,” Firelands head basketball coach Alan Januzzi said. “We’re battling and our kids are competing and they’re playing hard, but that’s what you want. You want them to play hard and you want them to have a good attitude and you control effort and attitude and our kids have been doing a good job.” Open Door forced the Falcons into making mistakes, as they turned the ball over nine times in the first half and 19 times for the game. “I felt like we came out active on the defensive end,” Open Door head basketball coach Todd Wright. “This is a really tough place to play, and we’ve never had much success here over the years, and coach Januzzi is just a great coach and great motivator of his guys. We knew they’d be ready to play, and we really just wanted to come out with a lot of energy on the defensive side so we can use that and turn it into offense for us.” The Patriots put three players in double digits while shooting 24-of-40 from the field as a team and 8-of-30 from behind the arc. “I thought we did a nice job of executing,” Wright said. “I didn’t think we did a great job of making shots all the time, especially in the second half, but I thought we did a nice job getting the shots that we wanted. Again, we got a lot of them to fall in the first half, we could’ve shot the ball a little better in the second have, but I was pleased with how we executed.” Meanwhile, Firelands went 18-of-38 from the field and 8-of-15 from behind the arc. Junior forward Jacob Schmitz had a team-high 20 points, followed by sophomore guard Caden Bomback with 17 points off the bench. “This has all been a learning experience for them,” Januzzi said. “I’m just pleased with the way we’re competing. Open door is a very good basketball team and Todd (Wright) has a special year going and we wish him the best. They have an opportunity to finish the year strong and make some noise in the tournament, so we’re pulling for them.” Open Door looks to head into the tournament with momentum, despite having several regular season games left on their plate. “I think our next week is going to be really important,” Bublinec said. “We have five games in the next eight days, so we have to be really tough mentally and physically and just push that all the way through tournament time.”