CBA, La Salle advance to semis
Buddington’s defense a big factor for Brothers in victory over Scotties
In the days leading up to the Class AA quarterfinal against Ballston Spa, CBA guard Lenny Buddington was tasked with guarding high-scoring standout Nick Verdile in the Brothers’ man-to-man defense.
The senior more than answered the challenge Saturday afternoon.
Buddington’s stout defense helped CBA hold Verdile without a point and the inside game of Ayden Harrington and David Clement provided plenty of scoring as the Brothers never trailed in knocking off the Scotties 58-40 at Hudson Valley Community College.
No. 3 seed CBA (17-4) advances to the semifinals Tuesday and will meet LaSalle at Cool Insuring Arena in Glens Falls. La Salle beat Niskayuna 54-51 in overtime behind 23 points from Adam Meyers.
“Lenny Buddington had about the best performance that I’ve seen from a guard defending a great player in a long time,” CBA coach David Doemel said. “He (Verdile) is a handful to defend, and Lenny did exactly what we asked him to do. He had a little help from his friends but that is what it is all about. Lenny did the bulk of the work.”
Buddington covered Verdile in a matchup early in the season and was ready for the rematch, holding Verdile to just five shots in the game just a few days after he tallied 25 for Ballston Spa (14-6) in an openinground win over Colonie.
“We knew they had good scorers in Verdile and (Andrew) Haught and our goal was to shut them down,” Buddington said. “I remember last time he put a number on me. I didn’t want that to happen again. I really wanted to lock him down. He had 17 on me.”
Going into the game, Harrington was confident in Buddington’s ability to keep Verdile at bay.
“He is a great offensive player,” Harrington said. “He is tremendous, but the game plan was to stop him. Lenny did a great job on him. I felt confident going in. He did a fantastic job.”
With the defensive lockdown in place, CBA turned to the inside play of Harrington and Clement with efficient results.
Harrington had 13 of his game-high 19 points in the second half, most of them from in the paint, as CBA turned a 21-14 halftime lead into a 34-19 advantage with just less than three minutes left in the third period.
“I thought David and Ayden working the high low, passing to each other, I thought they did a tremendous job,” Doemel said. “They controlled the backboards for us.”
Harrison added a game-high 11 rebounds in the win while Clement finished with 12 points and seven boards.
“We try to work together, we do it really well,” Harrington said. “It has been working all season, might as well keep at it. We started running more plays where we could get inside. We weren’t shooting the ball that well, different atmosphere, we ran more plays to get inside and it really worked out for us.”
Haught led Ballston Spa with 17 points and Blaine Zoller added 10.
Haught had five points in an 8-2 Ballston Spa run late in the third quarter to cut the deficit to 36-27, but CBA responded in the fourth quarter as Clement had seven of his 12 and Harrington added six points in a row to ice the win.