Christ the King rises up over Jefferson
BROOKLYN, NY – Sunday’s game between the Orange Wave and the Christ the King Royals was chock filled with juicy subplots. Thomas Jefferson Campus, a Public School, repped Kings County while the Royals are a Catholic School from Queens. Then there was the David and Goliath factor with the undersized Jefferson hosting an oversized CK.
Coming off an upset season opening loss against Cardinal Hayes, Christ the King was hoping to bounce back against a scrappy and undefeated Orange Wave. At first blush, it appeared to be déjà vu all over again as the Royals once again found themselves crawling out of a hole but in a collaborative team effort, the Middle Village, NY squad rose up over Jefferson to notch its first win, 85 – 76.
Before the game, Royals Head Coach Joe Arbitello said he spoke to his team about the upside and downside of having championship pedigree. “I tried to explain to them that Christ the King has a target on it’s back. In the last nine years we have five city championships and three federation championships. More than almost the City combined. Even though teams win, they still wanna make their mark beating Christ the King.” He wanted his newer players to therefore match their opponent’s intensity before anything else.
Christ the King drew first blood with 6'7" Phillips Joseph ‘19 and 6’11” Kofi Cockburn ‘19 scoring outside and inside but Marcus Burnett ’20 and Jaquan Carlos ’21 countered and Jefferson took an early four-point lead. Quaran McPherson ‘20 and Ryan Myers ‘19 responded for the Royals with 6’10” Moussa Cisse ’21 providing shot blocking but the Orange Wave held serve and retained a 6-point advantage as the first quarter ended.
Jefferson extended its lead with good ball movement and solid transition play. Kareem Welch ’19 and Carlos provided the offense along with inside play from big man Ashaunte Manuel ’18. With three-minutes left in the half, Christ the King’s deficit grew to 14 points a lot of which was due to good free-throw shooting along with efficient perimeter shooting by Jefferson’s guards.
“Our offense hasn’t been great,” said Coach Arbitello. "Two seven-footers out there, they can do a lot but you gotta run stuff [for them].” Arbitello added that both Hayes and Jefferson were taking advantage of playing on a small court by doubling his players. “We decided to keep it simple [in the second half] and try to throw the ball inside and then [assistant] coach [Artie] Cox drew up something at halftime. A very simple 2-1-2 [offensive strategy] that seemed to work really well for us.”
Down 40 – 29 to start the third quarter, Cockburn and Cisse began to impose their will above the rim as well as on the defensive end. The Royals defensive assertiveness, however, came at a cost with Cisse picking up his 4th foul with 4 minutes left in the quarter.
Jefferson’s armor began to show cracks as turnovers and poor second half free-throw shooting emerged. Their two big men, Manuel and Stephen Moncrieffe ‘18 fouled out to add insult to injury.
Tyson Walker ‘18, Myers and Cockburn provided offense late for the Royals and after being down by 11, the Royals only trailed by 4 points as the final quarter got underway. While Jefferson maintained a lead, they were slowly losing their momentum and discipline.
“We were confident and cocky,” said Jefferson head coach Lawrence “Bud” Pollard due to the Orange Waves’ previous impressive home wins. Consequently, “We gave it away,” he confessed.
The Royals took to the air in the fourth quarter but not due to perimeter shooting but because of Cisse‘s vicious slam dunks on the heads of Jefferson players on the regular, oftentimes without regard for human life. Five-minutes remained in regulation and a massive dunk by the freshman tied the game at 65. A steal and basket by Walker finally put Christ the King in the driver’s seat.
The Wave managed to tie the game at 71 due to clutch baskets by Dashan Crittenden ’19 but the tide had already turned as Cisse and Cockburn continued to punish Jefferson at the rim. A minute remained, and Jefferson had climbed into the hole that Christ the King climb out of in the first half. Down by 6 points with a minute left to play, the Royals went on to win by 11. This time Goliath got the best of David
“Me and my team, we just stuck together,” said Myers regarding facing adversity. "We were going to stick together through wins and through losses.”
Coach Pollard believes his team forgot to focus on finishing and got away from what made them successful. That and losing its bigs along with not getting the ball to Carlos in the fourth quarter. Regarding his team's loss, Pollard said "They needed that."
Cockburn led Christ the King with 21 points, 10 rebounds and 2 assists. Cisse added 16 points, 8 rebounds and 3 blocks with Myers contributing 10 points, 4 rebounds and 3 assists. Carlos paced Jefferson with a game high 27 points.
Christ the King improves to 1 – 1 while Thomas Jefferson falls to 3 - 1.
