The Oneida Daily Dispatch (Oneida, NY)
VVS too much for General Brown
Stage is set for VVS, Chittenango Class B semifinal rematch
VERONA, N.Y. » The start of Tuesday’s Section III Class B quarterfinal contest between Vernon-Verona-Sherrill and General Brown was reminiscent of a 3-point shooting contest.
VVS senior Jake Engler scorched the net, hitting 5-of-5 from deep to lead the Red Devils to a 26-point first quarter. Not to be outdone, General Brown’s Kyle Nichols countered with four 3-pointers of his own to help the visitors keep pace in an explosive first quarter.
At the end of one, the Red Dev- ils held a 26-21 lead at home.
VVS followed the fireworks display in the first quarter with a stout defensive effort, limiting Nichols to a single 3-ball the rest of the way and outscoring General Brown by 15 in the final three quarters of play enroute to an 8262 quarterfinal win.
“The defense was really key tonight,” VVS coach Andy Cossette said. “TJ [Horodnick] did a great job when we went box-and-1 on [Nichols] who made five first half threes.”
Engler had a game high 24 points for VVS followed by Dewey Roden with 20. Davey Moffett posted a double-double for the Red Devils with 14 points and 11
rebounds.
Nichols paced General Brown with 21, followed by Jake Heller with 16. Nate Palmer had 8 assists and five steals. Moffett had 11 rebounds and T.J. Horodnick and Dewey Roden had 8 rebounds a piece.
“VVS is a very good basketball team. Their size really, really hurt us,” said General Brown coach Jim Covey. “I was proud of the way our kids played. We were down 15 at the half and up to 20 points at one point. I just wantedmy kids to work hard and bring that down to at least 10 points and work from there. We just couldn’t find a way to get over the top; they had too many weapons for us both on the post and the perimeter.”
After Engler’s hot start, Moffett took over the VVS attack in the second quarter, netting 10 points to help the Red Devils carry a 4833 lead into the intermission.
In the second half, VVS held Nichols in check, limiting the sharpshooter to single-digit scoring.
“[Coach] told us to not even let him touch the ball, not even to catch the ball,” Engler said of the Red Devil defensive effort after the game. “Wewere really keen on defense. That is what we’re trying to focus on in this sectional run. We know we have a good offense; we need our defense to really keep us in those close games. We know if we keep teams to low scores that we can rely on our offense to win the game.”
Though General Brown was able to pull within 10 with four minutes left in the fourth quarter, VVS scored four straight buckets, capped by a Blake VanDreason 3-pointer to seal it.
“We’ve gotta go; we can’t hold the ball. When we start holding the ball we get in trouble,” Cossette said of the VVS offense. “Very happy with the win. Jake Engler had a great game tonight, he made a lot of shots, scored a lot of points.”
The win sends VVS back to the Section III Class B seminfinals to take on the Chittenango Bears, the team responsible for oust- ing the Red Devils from Class B playoffs last season.