LANDON HOOPS UPSET #6 EPISCOPAL IN OVERTIME, 83-80

In what one veteran Landon basketball cognoscenti characterized as the best display of Landon BB ever, Joe Mc Donald had 49 points, 18 rebounds, and countless steals (including the final EHS effort to score with 2.7 seconds left in OT and THE 3 point play at the buzzer to send the game into overtime. That exceptional effort broke a string of 5 consecutive EHS victories. To add to the historical perspective, as offered by Mac Jacoby, the best single game would include the games played by Bear Great Fred Hetzel, a 2 time All American at Davidson, the #1 draft choice in the 1965 draft and a 3 time WaPo All Met player. The Bears then totally dominated their opponents; so Fred did not have to play late into the game.

It would be a great disservice to fail to note that the other 10 Bears contributed to this win; scrapping for balls, blocking shots, rebounding, making smart passes, rebounding and scoring key points. A few representative examples:

• as the Maroon took an initial 4 point lead in OT, Deion Wellington hit two key buckets to put the Bears up by one (unofficial total of

• Sophomore Harry Laird won the initial tip, played great D against the visitors’ big men and put up 8points,

• Bear big men, Cyrus House and Sebastian Wells, clogged up the middle, blocked shots, scrambled on the floor to get balls and hustled up ‘n down the court,

•  Lax Midfielder Hank Brown, playing on the hard courts for the first time in a number of years, played yeoman minutes – making sharp passes, taking charges and playing solid D. After the game, he had the same joyous smile as seen after an RP victory, and

• Many, many moments of Bears playing hard to assure a victory.

It did not hurt that EHS and future Wake Forest stud, Amaud Adala Moto did not play due to a bad knee, nor were the Maroon helped by the absence of GWU recruit, Kethan Savage, who fouled out at 1:32 of the 4^th Q when he tried unsuccessfully to steal a ball from future Colonial teammate, Joe Mac.

In fact the scoreboard after almost 4 minutes of the 1^st Q included only points from Kethan and Joe, Landon 6 EHS 5. From that point to the end of the first period, the visitors established a comfortable 19- 10 lead.

END OF 1^ST PERIOD EHS 19 LANDON 10  

The visitors and the home team battled back and forth with the lead fluctuating from 9 points to five and back. The last 3 minutes before half, the Bears defense held the Maroon to two points, while Deion, Tumi Onaghise and Joe baskets brought the margin to 2.

ð It should be noted that a group of VERY talented Landon musicians rocked Riddleburger Gym at halftime with some awesome riffs!!!

HALFTIME EHS 32 LANDON 30

The 8 minutes of the third period saw the two squads with the tie scored five times. As a harbinger of the time as-of-yet unplayed, the Bears #22 scored the last two points of this quarter a 0:03.2

END OF 3^RD QUARTER LANDON 46 EHS 46

The visitors took early command of the game creating a five point lead at 5:45, 55-50 and then 62-55 at 3:37. Buckets by Deion and Sebastian narrowed it to six points. Then Joe took over, scoring the remaining eight points, most notable hitting a 3 pointer well beyond the arc at 0:00

END OF 4^TH QUARTER LANDON 71 EHS 71

The clock was set for four minutes and the two teams showed how their styles varied. EHS relied almost exclusively on their remaining stud, Doug Chappell, while Landon played a team game—a hoop by Joe, followed by a put back bucket by Isaiah Colclough and then two successive scores by Deion. That last entry in the scorebook put the Bears ahead 79-78 with 1:15 remaining. Pressure defenses by both teams forcing misses by the opponents ate up the next 50 seconds. Chappell gave the visitors a lead with 18 seconds left, 80-79. Coach Luther obviously put the ball in Joe’s hands for the remainder of the game and EHS fouled #22 each time. The result—4 straight swishes for Joe from the charity stripe, 83- 80! With 2.7 seconds left, EHS Coach Fitzpatrick called a time out to set up a play and Coach Luther set up a D to stop a score. SURPRISE—as I suspect Coach Luther diagrammed, the inbounds pass ended up in the hands of Joe and time ran out.

FINAL SCORE LANDON 83 EPISCOPAL 80

There were no official statistics available by this posting, the below is a rough approximation of the Bears Scoring:

Player                                                pointsPlayer                                                points

McDonald                            49

Wellington                           13

Laird                                        8

Sarter                                                  4

Bradford                                 3

Colclough                               2

Onaghise                                2

House                                                  2

NEXT GAME BEARS @ RP 1/31 at 6pm