(Middle College's Gary Foster glides to the basket against McKinley)
When it comes to Yale Cup I basketball, there's one simple rule I follow - don't miss the games between the city's top two teams. Forget what the records are, or who just beat who, because none of it ever seems to matter. Middle College entered last night's game barely over .500 and had lost to Health Sciences, who got blitzed at St. Mary's. McKinley came in as an undefeated & top ranked large school that even has two people throwing first place votes its way in the large school poll. Well, throw it all out the window. City pride, as I've learned over the last decade, is something you won't truly understand until you witness it. Some of the most exciting and exhilarating games I've ever been at are annual occurrences - the matchups between the city's top two teams vying for the Yale Cup. Last night was no exception to the rule.
Shaquan Jones scored a game-high 27 points to lead McKinley back from a seven-point deficit with 3:34 to go, where they forced overtime and then defeated Middle College in the extra session, earning a 79-71 victory. It was the first competitive game of the season for the Macks, who are now 12-0 and in first place in Yale Cup I heading into Saturday's MLK Classic headliner against Canisius.
"We needed this," McKinley coach Zaire Dorsey said. "When you win by 20/30 points and you're scoring 100 points here and there, when you tell the kids they're doing something wrong, nobody wants to listen to you. So a game like today when you make mistakes and then you can point that out to them, now you'll have their attention."
Midway through the third quarter, the Kats certainly caught the attention of McKinley. Jones had just swished a hanging, fade away jumper, to put his Macks in front, 40-34, after a three-point lead at halftime. But then the zone defense of Middle College began to challenge McKinley and created some opportunities for the Kats to leak out the other way. Middle College began scoring easy, uncontested baskets off McKinley misses and when they weren't scoring on the fast break, they were dropping treys. The Kats mounted a 14-0 run in the middle of the third quarter that put McKinley in an eight-point hole - its largest deficit of the season.
"They're big, their size was a factor. After they got the defensive rebounds, our guards did not get back and they threw the ball over the top a couple times, fast break situations," said Dorsey. "We were gambling for steals at the top and that allowed their point guard to penetrate. When we stepped up to stop the penetration, they started hitting shooters."
Gary Foster scored eight of his 20 points in the third quarter for the Kats, while Jojo Staton hit a pair of 3-pointers during the Middle College run and scored seven of his team-high 21 points in the frame.
The third quarter ended with Jones connecting from downtown for McKinley, followed by Keyon Johnson streaking down the court to beat the defense for a layup, and the Macks were back within three points, 53-50, heading into the final stanza.
"Once we cleaned that up, stopped gambling, played defense, attacked the basket, and made a couple of shots - then we was back in the game," said Dorsey.
Even as the Macks had made some adjustments, Middle College was still feeding off the momentum they'd built in the third quarter. Midway through the fourth, Billy Rivera sank a 3-pointer from the corner in front of his team's bench to put the Kats back up by seven, 64-57.
Over the final 3:34 of regulation, McKinley played with the desperation of a team that wasn't ready to lose for the first time. No player embodied that spirit more than Jones, who willed his team back. The senior scored eight points in three minutes to lead a 10-1 run for McKinley. His last basket came as he cut through the lane off a feed from Johnson with 26 seconds left, and gave the Macks their first lead, 67-65, since Middle College had taken it from them in the third quarter.
Eight seconds after Jones put his Macks up, Staton tied the game back up at 67-67 when he took the inbound pass and dribbled the length of the court to knife through the McKinley defense and finish at the rim. On the Macks' final possession of regulation, Avius Outlaw slipped trying to take his defender one-on-one and had to hurry an off-balance shot that came up short, sending the game to overtime.
The extra session was anti-climatic, as Middle College seemed deflated from letting the game slip through its grip in regulation. McKinley outscored the Kats, 12-4, in the last four minutes, with four Macks contributing to the scoring.
The rematch is Thursday, February 11th at Bennett High School, and the coveted Yale Cup trophy is sure to be in attendance.
Point Totals
McKinley: Shaquan Jones 27, Avius Outlaw 18, Keyon Johnson 12, Kesean Fisher 7, Bruce Booker 5, Morrell Buster 3, Kavon Rogers 3, Rayquan Goree 2, Davonti Wardlaw 2
Middle College: Jojo Staton 21, Gary Foster 20, Brian Johnson 12, Amir Jemes 8, Billy Rivera 8, Terrell Jackson 2
-centercourt
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