CENTRAL NEW YORK – All of those impressive victories by all of those lopsided margins is starting to get the Chittenango boys basketball team some recognition beyond Central New York circles.
The Bears found itself at no. 12 in last week’s state Class B rankings, the direct byproduct of a trio of lospided wins the week before, including one over a 9-2 Vernon-Verona-Sherrill side on Jan. 23.
Chittenango’s fun continued Tuesday night, at Mexico, where again a torrid start decided matters early as the Bears put away the Tigers 72-40.
By now, the habit of putting up a lot of first-quarter points is well known to Chittenango’s opponents. Even with that, though, Mexico couldn’t keep the Bears for jumping out 34-11 in the game’s first eight minutes.
A 20-7 tear through the third quarter as impressive, too, with Bryce Bishop leading the way as his 21 points included five 3-pointers. Ryan Moesch had 18 points, with Ty Kelly getting 10 points as they all more than made up for Alex Moesch getting a season-low seven points.
As for Cazenovia, it met Westhill for the second time this winter and, unlike that first encounter, it wasn’t that close as the Lakers lost to the Warriors 84-43.
Cazenovia only trailed 41-28 at halftime, but went cold in the third quarter as the Warriors outscored them 26-7 in that frame.
A.J. Rothfeld,the Lakers’ leading scorer, was held to a single field goal and the Lakers could not overcome it. Matt Compeau had 10 points, with Tanner Ackermann getting nine points. Ben Bianco and Jack Byrnes had six points apiece.
To its credit, Cazenovia found its way back to the win column on Friday night, traveling to Altmar-Parish-Williamstown and defeating the Rebels 65-50 to break a five-game skid.
A 24-13 push through the second quarter gave the Lakers a 42-28 halftime edge, which it kept the rest of the way despite APW’s Blake Pugh getting 25 points, six assists and five rebounds.
