Iona Prep Trashes St. Rays In Rematch

BRONX, NY - Iona Prep entered Raven Country with a singular mission. To get some 'Get Back' for a home loss to St. Ray's earlier in the season. Their retribution came in the form of a 77-43 trouncing on Tuesday evening in the re-match.

"It was just one of those days," said Iona Prep Head Coach Vic Quirolo regarding his team's offensive accuracy.

Matt Ryan, who led Iona Prep with 24 points (16 in the first half), said that during the first game, "We shot 3 for 22." During Tuesday's game, the Gaels shot a sizzling 9-16 from three point range and 24 of 33 from two point range.

"The number one thing was defensive rebounds," said Ryan. "Last time they beat us up on the boards." The Notre Dame bound forward also led Iona Prep with 9 rebounds.

To be on the butt end of a 20-2 deficit at the end of the opening quarter was definitely not the plan for St. Raymond. The Gaels defense lulled the Ravens into taking bad perimeter shots. Their porous defense allowed Iona Prep to rack up points. St. Rays got torched early on by Ty Jerome (15 points & 4 assists) and 5'11" senior guard Tom Capuano (18 points & 7 assists).

The run continued in the second quarter as Ryan got hot and hit a floater followed by two trey bombs. Iona Prep upped its advantage to 28-2 with 6:30 left in the half.

Even though the game was going better than planned, the Gaels received a reality check. "Coach [Quirolo] called a timeout," said Ryan. "He said we're playing great but stay even keeled."

Iona Prep kept the pedal to the metal. It wouldn't be until 5:26 left in the half before Cahiem Brown (14 points) briefly ended the Ravens offensive drought. A high flying dunk by Sid Wilson (7 points) would at least show that St. Rays had a pulse as they tried to crawl out from a 32-9 gutter.

A winding drive by Isaiah Washington (9 points) cut the Gaels lead to 20 points and an emphatic block by Wilson and two more points by Washington pumped up the Ravens volume. A drive by Jerome and a three-ball by Gio Gabbidon kept the Gaels up by 23 with 2 minutes left in the half but the New Rochelle team was momentarily finding it harder to run their stuff due to increased Ravens defensive pressure.

The Ravens got to within 19 points with a minute left but Capuano turned up the offensive afterburners and put Iona Prep ahead 41-18 at the half.

The Gaels dominated the third quarter with good transition play and increased their lead to 49-21 with 4:02 remaining. "C'mon. You guys are giving up on me," St. Ray's Head Coach Jorge Lopez said to his team in the huddle but it became abundantly clear that his team had already mentally left their own building.

With 3:14 Capuano vaulted the lead to 31 from the charity stripe. Brown muscled his way in for an and-1 and a midrange but overall the Ravens were merely exchanging baskets. A Capuano putback put Iona Prep up, 62-33 as the final quarter commenced.

A trey from the top of the key by Jerome continued to set up a downward spiral for a young Ravens squad. Down 38 points with 4:36 left to play, Iona Prep would sub out and beat down St. Rays getting revenge for losing to St. Raymond by 11 points in December.

"Last time we kinda settled for quick threes," Coach Quirolo admitted. "Today we took threes but we also had good ball and player moment."

St. Raymond falls to 7-4 while Iona Prep's record improves to 10-3.