Bobcats Surprised by Lourdes in the Class A Semifinals
As gifted athletically as he is, and as many intangibles he provides on the court, Our Lady of Lourdes senior guard Kevin
Townes had only scored a single point up until the moment he rose in the air to shoot the ball from the right elbow with just over two minutes remaining in last Wednesday night’s Section 1, Class A semifinal game against Byram Hills.
The rare shot by Townes, a 3-pointer from beyond even the NBA line, rattled around the rim and quickly dropped through, erasing a one-point Bobcat edge and giving Lourdes the lead for good. His timely basket helped lift the upset-minded Warriors to a 54-48 victory at the Westchester County Center and brought a premature close to the season for the top-seeded Bobcats, who were seeking their second straight sectional title.
“Yeah, that was a big shot,” said Bobcats coach Ted Repa afterwards. “He gave a shot fake and he got us off balance and he came back and went further away from the basket and still knocked it down. That was a tough one.”
On a night when the fifth-seeded Warriors shot 30 free throws to just five for Byram Hills, it still took a huge basket from an unlikely source to end the Bobcats’ quest for another Gold Ball. Facing the same team they had eliminated in the semifinals a year ago and then again at home in mid-December, the Bobcats built a lead as large as eight points in the first half.
But the Warriors, led by relentless senior center James Anozie, who finished with 27 points and 15 rebounds, never allowed the Bobcats to get ahead by more than five points after halftime. And when Byram went scoreless over the game’s final two minutes and 45 seconds, missing its final 10 shots from the field, they closed with a 7-0 run to steal the contest.
“Credit to Lourdes,” said Repa. “They played a really great game. They were prepared, they had our scouting report. Yeah, we’re a little shocked right now. We didn’t see this one coming.”
The Bobcats, riding the wave of a 17-game winning streak since losing to Iona Prep the last week of 2016 at the Slam Dunk Tournament, also at the County Center, jumped out to a quick, early lead. Both Matt Groll, who finished with 14 points and eight blocked shots, and Willy Samsen connected on 3-point shots and their lead grew to 8-2 when Skylar Sinon fed Ben Leff for a layup.
Lourdes answered with a 9-2 burst, but the quarter ended with back-to-back baskets by Samsen and Groll, enabling Byram Hills to grab a 14-11 advantage. The Bobcats stretched their lead to 23-15 with a 7-0 run that began with another Samsen 3-pointer and ended with Leff again scoring inside on a pass from Sinon.
But the Warriors, who wound up edging second-seeded Tappan Zee in the championship game, got nine points from Anozie in the second quarter and closed the half with a 3-point basket by freshman Aidan Hildebrand that sliced the Bobcats’ edge to just 28-24.
Anozie scored five of his points in the second quarter at the charity stripe. And even though Lourdes wound up making just 16 of its 30 free-throws attempts, the constant parade to the foul line, especially by Anozie, proved costly for a Bobcat team anxious to get out and run.
“He was getting to the foul line and that stops the flow of the game,” said Repa. “And we weren’t getting to the foul line at all. We were attacking the rim and we weren’t getting the calls. So it kind of slowed us up and I think there was some frustration setting in. We got no flow into our transition game. That was the main thing.”
The Warriors eventually tied the game on a Brady Hildebrand drive along the left baseline with 2:21 left in the third quarter. Samsen, a sharpshooting sophomore with size and spring who finished with a team-high 16 points, canned his third and fourth 3-pointers of the night in the final two minutes of the period, enabling Byram Hills to take a 38-37 lead with eight minutes remaining.
Groll’s straightaway 3-pointer a minute into the fourth quarter opened a 43-38 edge. A pullup jumper by Sinon with 5:35 to go gave the Bobcats a 45-40 lead. But Lourdes answered with a 6-0 run, finally taking their first lead since late in the opening period on a pair of foul shots from John Arceri. Two free throws by Leff with 3:21 left then sent Byram back ahead 47-46.
After an Anozie free throw tied the game again, Sinon made one of two foul shots to lift the Bobcats to a 48-47 edge. But they never scored again and Townes provided his pivotal 3-point shot with 2:09 on the clock after pump faking, then dribbling once to his left. Samsen soon had a drive along the baseline swatted out of bounds, then misfired on a trey from the left corner.
When Anozie scored his final bucket of the night, a layup with 39 seconds to go that extended the Warriors’ lead to five points, their fans up in the baseline balcony began to celebrate. The Bobcats’ last gasp came with 17 seconds left as Erik Lewerenz was unable to hit on a 3-point try from the right corner.
The surprising loss brought an end to the varsity careers of Groll and point guard Matt Milone, and Repa knows it won’t be easy next year without them.
“We’re gonna miss those seniors quite a bit,” he said. “They’ve left quite a legacy. It’s kind of impossible to put into words. The level of care that they have for the team, the program, what it means to them, that’s hard to replace. Hopefully, that tradition will be passed on.”
Repa conceded that the postgame chat he just had with his players was among the most difficult of his coaching career.
“It wasn’t a fun time,” he said. “I’ve got nothing but love for those guys. Yeah, it’s hard to process right now. I really didn’t see it coming. I thought we were gonna do better.”
Andy is a sports editor at Examiner Media, covering seven high schools in the mid-Westchester region with a notebook and camera. He began there in the fall of 2007 following 15 years as a candid photographer for the largest school picture company in the tri-state area.
Read more of Andy’s full bio here.
Read Andy’s archived work here.
