Clarkstown North Boys Basketball Scores Thrilling Victory Over John Jay

The Clarkstown North Rams scraped by the John Jay East Fishkill Patriots 88-87 at home Thursday night in a heart-pounding, overtime, out-bracket boys basketball game worthy of a finals match-up.

Both teams left it all on the floor in a game that was neck and neck from beginning to end.  The fast-paced, high-intensity game in front of a packed house had everyone’s adrenaline pumping and emotions running high as the game wore on.

Foul trouble at the end forced the Rams to dig deep and rely on the bench to step up and make some big plays, which they did when it counted.  With one minute to go in overtime, North took their biggest lead of the night, 86-78.  Despite a push by John Jay at the end to bring it within one, North was able to hold on to move on in the post-season.

“[It was neck and neck] the whole way through,” said the Rams head coach Danny Goldberg.  “I guess that’s a hard-nosed, great playoff game where they made a run, we made a run.  I don’t know off the top of my head what the biggest lead was, maybe six points, nine points, I really don’t know.  It might have been in overtime the biggest lead that we had.  I’m speaking from the side that we won, but just to watch, it had to have been a phenomenal game, back and forth, high scoring.  Their kid, Segarra, he was unreal today.  We tried a million and one different things and nothing worked.  But, in the end, our kids didn’t stop playing.  We had a lot of depth and it was great.  We had multiple guys foul out and a guy just filling in in crucial positions and playing well.”

Patrick Mensah expanded on this, saying, “It took a lot of hard-work keeping your mindset and your mind right.  You’ve just got to come out here and keep your mind right.  Don’t fall for any pressure, just keep the right head.  That’s all you have to do, and play as a team.”

“They’re a good team,” added Anthony Barbetto.  “We watched some film on them.  When we played, we knew #5 was going to be an aggressive scorer.  Coming into half-time and after the half, they were just keying in on me and stopping me going baseline.  I just had to find my teammates and let them do what they can do.”

In the high-scoring, fast-paced game, successfully executing offensively was the key for both team’s ability to keep the game so close.

“Their guy, Segarra, he’s a top-notch player,” said Goldberg.  “We obviously didn’t do a great job of slowing him down, he had over 40 points against us, so I don’t know what we did that well defensively.  Offensively, I really liked the way we started driving and dropping to our bigs.  Vinny Lleshaj had a lot of finishes.  Anthony Barbetto did a great job of that.  We had some drive and kicks that were very nice and I really liked offensively, when I called my two little guys.  We had Joey Feinberg and Zach Jarrett for me, two more sophomores, and they played great.  They really held down the fort for a lot of big minutes.”

Barbetto agreed, saying “Offensively, we were getting what we needed, we were getting our looks and everything.  Defensively, we just couldn’t stop #5.  We tried putting two guys on him, but he just kept getting around.  At the end, he hit like 20 out of 22 free throws.  He was a good kid.”

Mensah was happy with the win, but was already focusing on todays game and what they need to do to improve, saying, “It’s a win, but we had a little foul trouble here and there and we can’t have that tomorrow.  Definitely, can’t have that tomorrow.  We’ve just got to come out smarter, come out aggressive and come out smart, that’s it.”

As Mensah pointed out, central to the Rams’ success was their ability to stay collected and play smart basketball for the most part, even amidst all that intensity and emotion.

“I felt like, I’ve been in the situation so many times that, it’s just another game,” said Mensah.  “I didn’t even think about it a lot.  That’s when I mess up, when you think, you mess up.  You’ve just got to play basketball.”

While his team fought to keep their composure and get the win, Barbetto was forced to watch from the sideline after he fouled out in the fourth following a series of hotly questioned calls, which made the win for him especially sweet.

“It was so good.  My teammates pulled through and got the win for me.  Because, if we had lost, I would’ve went crazy," Barbetto said. "I was going nuts, just sitting on the bench.  I was just walking back and forth and people were telling me to sit down and I couldn’t sit down.  I couldn’t sit, it was just agonizing.”

In a game that was neck and neck from the onset, and stayed so throughout the game, both team’s played exceptionally well and the win could have gone to either one.

North pulled ahead right away after winning the tip-off in the first with a 6-0 run off of two consecutive turnovers by John Jay.  The Patriots took control then to end the first with a 20-13 lead.

The two teams traded points to start the second, however, midway through, North went on a run driven by turnovers and scoring in transition to take the lead away from the Patriots.  The quarter ended with the Rams leading 38-34.

Throughout the first half, the scoring was spread pretty evenly amongst all the players on both teams.  Rob McMahon led the Patriots with 11 for the half and Nick Segarra backed him up with 7.  Feinberg and Barbetto each led the Rams with 7 points a piece.  Lleshaj was not far behind with 6 points himself.

The two teams stayed neck and neck in the third as they traded points and the lead to end it with John Jay leading North 55-52.  Segarra took control in the third to keep his team in it with 13 of their 21 that quarter.  North’s 14 was fairly evenly spread around the team as they continued to play unselfishly and look for that extra pass.

The two teams continued to trade points in the fourth.  As the intensity picked up with things coming down to the wire, play picked up speed and fouls began to mount on both sides.  Then, with 3:46 to go, Barbetto fouled out after a series of calls that were questioned strongly by the spectators and the players.

“Emotions were flying,” said Barbetto.  “I was just so mad I fouled out, because I thought I had all ball, but the ref saw differently.  I knew it, so I just got so mad.  Sitting there, in overtime, I couldn’t sit still, I kept moving back and forth, I just couldn’t sit still.”

With North trailing John Jay 74-72, it all came down to the final seconds of the fourth quarter.  Lleshaj caught the entry pass and made the lay-up to tie it up and send it into overtime with six seconds to go.

Mensah and Brendan Hendrickson came out strong for North to open overtime with six unanswered points.  Segarra fought to keep his team in it with 11 points, however it would not be enough.

With under a minute to go, the Rams were up 88-80.  However, with emotions running high, they made some errors and the Patriots capitalized on the turnovers.  North's Travis Samuels fouled out with 14 seconds to go as the Patriots brought it to 88-84.  Segarra’s shot at the buzzer was good, however it fell one point short of sending it into double overtime and the Rams held on to take home the hard-earned, dramatic 88-87 victory.

“It was wild,” said Goldberg.  “I think that was a lot to do with the fact that we have an entire roster full of sophomores and they’re JV age, and here they are in an overtime, playoff game, about to win and I think they were probably floating.  I honestly don’t know if most of them remember the end of that game.  They were traveling, they were throwing the ball out bounds, they were beyond excited.”

Segarra put up an amazing effort to nearly win it for his team with 45 points.  Mensah led the Rams to victory with 21 on the night.  He was backed up by Lleshaj, Hendrickson and Barbetto,who had 16, 14 and 12, respectively.

“There’s no feeling like it,” said Goldberg.  “We were talking in the locker room, I don’t know when the last time was that North won a home playoff game.  It had to have been over a decade.  We’ve won playoff games before, but it was always on the road.  Here, we had a great opportunity to come home and win a playoff game and there’s no better feeling.”

“It feels good,” said Mensah of the win.  “But we’ve got to come out strong tomorrow, we’ve got Poughkeepsie.  Another tough game.”

“Tomorrow, we’re coming out, we’re ready,” echoed Barbetto.  “We know Poughkeepsie is a good team and undefeated right now, but we want to shock the world and we want to beat them.”

“My kids are excited,” said Goldberg of today’s game.  “Obviously, we play Poughkeepsie.  They’re the top seed, undefeated, but I couldn’t be happier to play another team and our kids actually want to play Poughkeepsie, because they look at it, a bunch of sophomores, and they say, we have an opportunity to do something great, or we’ll gain the experience.”

Win or lose, it has been a great run for the Rams and a thrilling start to the post-season.

“It was a great season,” said Barbetto.  “We all came together as one this year.  It was not like last year, there was no fighting, we all were just one.  We loved each other and that’s the bottom line, that’s how we had our team chemistry and played so well together, it was great.”