Northmen win wild contest

Savoie, Goulet combine for 50 points in victory

NORTH SMITHFIELD — The first-place North Smithfield boys basketball team built a 13-point halftime lead on visiting Ponaganset and secured an 89-78 Division III-North victory Tuesday night. Easy, right? “I’m a big fan of rollercoasters, I go to Six Flags when I can,” Northmen junior Ethan Savoie said. “Basketball is a game of runs. We have a bunch of streaky shooters, so when we’re hitting we can go up by 15, 20 points. When we are missing, it can look like it did in the first few minutes of the second half.”

After leading by as many as 15 points less than a minute into the second half, the Northmen watched as Steve DelSesto, Kyle Cullen and the Chieftains erased the double-digit deficit in just three minutes. The Northmen fell behind by as many as five points midway through the second half before junior guard Kyle Haner came off the bench to finally solve the home side’s defensive issues.

Haner, Steven Goulet, Micah Camble-Meriweather and the Northmen went on an 18-1 run late in the half to final put away the Chieftains in a wildly entertaining game between two up-tempo teams.

“One of the things we really have to work on is our consistency,” North Smithfield coach Brandon DiPaola said. “We talked at halftime about how they’re a really good team and they’re a fast-breaking team that likes to press. I knew that 13 points was nothing. We’re a feel-good team that is really good when we get going.”

North Smithfield (7-1 Division III-North) received another splendid effort from its pair of junior wings. Savoie scored 21 of his gamehigh 28 points in the opening half, while Goulet scored 13 of his 22 points in the second half and added 11 rebounds and seven assists. Sophomore center Andrec Viera Dones added 13 points and Camble-Meriweather piloted the offense with 10 points.

“Coming into this game we knew they were going to try to run and we knew they were going to shoot a lot of 3s,” Savoie said. “They made some amazing passes and amazing cuts, but when we play at our speed and our tempo we’re the fastest team in the division and the best offense in the division – you heard that here first.”

Ponaganset (3-5 Division III-North) were led by the talented DelSesto, who hit five 3-pointers and scored a team-high 27 points. Cullen chipped in with 19 points and forward

Cal Parrillo added 9 nine points.

The Chieftains’ biggest lead of the second half was five at 66-61 with 7:19 left thanks to a 7-0 run that was fueled by a DelSesto 3-pointer and a Cullen hoop. The Northmen, who struggled to contain the Chieftains in a 1-3-1 zone defense, inserted Haner and the tenor of the game changed.

The junior did a superb job as the bottom defender in the zone keeping the Chieftains from attacking the baseline, which fueled the Northmen’s transition offense. North Smithfield went on a 7-1 run over the next four minutes to build an 11-point lead with just over three minutes left in the game.

Hamer and Goulet both hit 3-pointers during the run, while Camble-Mierweather produced an acrobatic three-point play.

“This is a good group, but they’re still new and they’re still learning as we go,” DiPaola said. “I need more consistency and I think our effort has to go to the next level. To be honest, we haven’t played a good game yet. We’ve played good halves and we’ve played good five-minute spans, but we haven’t put a whole game together. It’s a bad thing, but it’s a good thing because we’re still winning.”

Goulet and Viera Dones started the game on the bench, which helped the Chieftains jump out to an eight-point lead before Savoie shot the Northmen into the lead. The Northmen went on an 11-1 run to take the lead and they slowed pulled away as the Chieftains attempted to turn the game into a track meet.

Savoie hit two 3-pointers and all five of his free throws to stretch the lead out to 15 before the Northmen settled for a 13-point advantage at halftime.

“Here’s how I figure it, you have to get an and-1 [three-point play], you have to get a 3-pointer and once you get that, you make a lay-up and then you’re feeling good,” Savoie said about his first-half performance. “You hit that first shot, you’re good.”