ONONDAGA COUNTY – Though it has just one defeat this winter, the West Genesee boys basketball team may need to win every game in the regular-season homestretch to climb to the top seed for the Section III Class AA playoffs.
A key to that push was a pair of games, two weeks apart, against a strong Fayetteville-Manlius side that, on Jan. 23, established its contending credentials by going to Christian Brothers Academy and winning 72-69 in overtime.
The Wildcats just happened to travel to F-M Tuesday night, and ignoring the hostile setting and a tough opponent, WG controlled matters from start to finish and beat the Hornets 66-55.
Maybe it helped that F-M expended so much energy in the CBA game, but the Wildcats didn’t assume anything and used its defense to hound the Hornets from the opening tip.
Having steadily gained a 34-27 lead by halftime, WG then outscored F-M 16-7 in the third quarter, all but putting the game away despite a late and frantic Hornets push.
Christian Cain set the tone with his hot outside shooting, hitting on five 3-pointers to account for most of his game-high 25 points as Jayden Macknail got 10 points and Christian Amica had eight points. Kerrick Albright and Gary McLane had seven points apiece.
F-M did get 16 points from Trevor Roe and 15 points from Pat Emery, but the Wildcats held Luke Davidson to just nine points, one of his lowest totals of the season.
Now WG faced Corcoran on Friday night, and moving to 15-1 overall, the Wildcats shut down the Cougars for long stretches on the way to a 62-51 victory.
Establishing a 15-7 margin in the first quarter, WG then continued to add to it, eventually outscoring Corcoran 18-9 in the third period for a 49-29 advantage.
Again leading the way, Christian Cain had 21 points, with Amica and Albright both earning 10 points. James Tully and Jordan Cain had seven points apiece.
This same Corcoran team had taken on Bishop Ludden Wednesday and the Gaelic Knights, who had lost nine of 10 game following a 3-0 start, finally broke out of its slump by beating the Cougars 85-77.
As it turned out, the first quarter was decisive as Ludden jumped out 23-11 and, for the rest of the game, had to withstand a Corcoran effort that included Amir Reaves pouring in 44 points, one of the best single-game totals in Section III this winter.
It helped the Gaelic Knights to have two superb efforts, one from Chad Cook, who had 29 points, and another from Jaiden Holloman, who got 26 points as Taysir Briggs added 12 points.
Ludden then beat Homer 67-49 on Friday night, opening the game with a 17-4 surge and never getting caught. Holloman led with 19 points, while Tim Dunham stepped up with 17 points and Cook got 14 points.
