To be sure, the Skaneateles boys basketball team was honored to participate in last Saturday’s Zebra Classic at Onondaga Community College’s Allyn Hall, playing in one of five games that featured local rivalries and, in some instance, old-school uniforms from the long-defunct Parochial League.
It’s just that the Lakers wished the timing was a bit better.
When Skaneateles had its second regular-season encounter with defending state Class B champion Westhill, it came less than 24 hours after it had ventured to East Syracuse to face undefeated, state Class B no. 7-ranked Bishop Grimes and took an 81-67 defeat to the Cobras.
The game against Bishop Grimes was a rematch of their Dec. 29 encounter at SRC Arena, where the Cobras had prevailed 67-54. Just 2 ½ weeks later, the point totals would go up – as would the foul totals and the tempers on both sides.
Never trailing, Grimes scored the game’s first eight points, and while Skaneateles answered with an 11-2 run, the game’s pattern was established. Whenever the Lakers put together any kind of scoring burst, the Cobras countered it in a hurry.
Helped by a 12-2 run and gaining the last six points of the half, Grimes put the Lakers in a 44-28 halftime deficit, only to see Skaneateles net the first eight points of the second half. Again, though, the Cobras closed the quarter strong, going on an 8-0 run to make it 62-46, and then stringing together 10 unanswered points in the fourth quarter to thwart a last Laker comeback attempt.
It didn’t help the Lakers that Pete Knupp fouled out early in the final period and that his teammates faced foul trouble, too. Indeed, no one seemed happy with the calls as both head coaches – Karl Norris for Skaneateles, Bob McKenney for Grimes – picked up technical fouls, as did a Cobras player, Dom Delvecchio.
Knupp only had four points amid his foul trouble, something that his teammates could not make up for, though Marc Pietropaoli had 22 points and Jake Reed added 20 points. A.C. Ater came off the bench to lead Grimes with 24 points, with Shawn Gashi adding 18 points.
And now came the rematch with Westhill, whom the Lakers lost to, 70-51, on Dec. 17 at home. Here, the Lakers faced a short-handed Warriors roster, but still was done in by the trio of Ryan Roland, Kameren Jackson and Sean Dadey, who combined to dominate the contest and hand Skaneateles an 85-60 loss.
Other than scoring the game’s first basket, the Lakers never led, and though he didn’t score until the game was more than four minutes old, Roland made up for it by piling up 24 first-half points, nearly as much as the entire Skaneateles roster as Westhill went to the break with a 46-25 lead.
From there, the Warriors were not seriously threatened again, though the Lakers did find some success thanks to Reed, whose 23 points included three 3-pointers. Knupp, avoiding the foul trouble that plagued him at Bishop Grimes, managed 15 points, while Pietropaoli had 10 points and Sam Duggan got six points.
Roland cooled off a bit, but he still finished with 33 points and five assists,. getting lots of help from Jackson, who had 21 points and eight rebounds, and Dadey, who put together a great all-around effort of 13 points, eight assists, seven rebounds and four steals.
Having fallen to 7-6 on the season, Skaneateles was set to host Hannibal on Tuesday (weather permitting) and visits Altmar-Parish-Williamstown on Friday night.
