Boys Varsity Basketball

In the first of two games last week, the Trojans reached the midway point of the season with a disappointing performance in the dimly-lit Sewanhaka gym on Tuesday, January 9th, losing 63-56. Although outrebounded by a large margin, with over a dozen missed lay-ups and chippies, turnovers, and poor foul shooting, and a soft defense on one of the Indians' 3-point shooters, Garden City dug themselves out of an early deep hole, and kept close with their 3/4 trap defense, but in the end it was the failure of one of their mainstays of the season, stretch clutch foul shooting, that sealed the loss. Sewanhaka meanwhile canned their foul shots to earn the victory.

Co-captains Rob Finneran (21) and Harry Kutner (12) led the scoring, with Mike Mancusi (10) and Owen Ludemann (6) contributing key points off the bench to keep the Trojans close in the second half. Finneran provided some theatrics with five emphatic blocks to discourage Sewanhaka's inside game.

On Friday, January 12th, Garden City lost their second game in a row, and their second game of the 6-game road trip, at Lawrence, suffering an uncharacteristic fourth quarter meltdown to lose 56-49.

Kutner netted 17 points to lead the Trojans, while Finneran and Ryan Beckstead (11 each) also had double figures. Only two others scored, John Haskoor and Mike Mancusi having 5 each. All season Garden City has gotten the ball deep inside, with the majority of points coming from the paint. But Lawrence threw a 2-3 zone at the Trojans, and they failed to get the ball to the high post, nor move it quickly to beat the zone. Again, missed layups and chippies plagued the team.

The varsity plays a rare day game on Saturday at Island Trees at noon, and then travels to Great Neck North on Tuesday, January 23rd at 7:00 p.m.

(schedule can be viewed at "www.GCAthletics.org/winter").