A county tournament championship won’t be at stake, just their own tournament championship. But that still carries a heavy weight with the Cyclones from South Side.
These boys put themselves in position to pursue the varsity’s fourth straight South Side Basketball Holiday Tournament title by beating Garden City, 54-37, Monday in the opening round.
The Cyclones will face Kellenberg for first prize Tuesday at 4 p.m.
“I think it’s really important,” said 6-6 forward/guard Ryan Schmitt, who paced them with 18 points. “It’s basically like an expectation for South Side. We’re going to host the tournament, we’ve got to win it; show everyone we’re the best team out there.”
They’re a 6-1 team with three returning starters and a lot of size, a team that also wants to show everyone that it’s the best out there at Nassau AA tournament time.
“I think we’re a long way from that goal, but I think it is a goal,” coach Jerry D’Angelo said.
They have two standout seniors in Schmitt and 6-4 point guard John Pericolosi at the forefront.
“John and Ryan definitely do a lot of things for us,” D’Angelo said, “but for us to be a team that’s going to be a playoff-level team, we need contributions from other kids.”
They received that in a game-breaking second quarter.
Garden City owned a 15-13 edge after eight minutes, but 6-4 senior forward Harris Breene contributed eight of his 10 points over the next eight minutes for the Cyclones.
They also stepped up defensively and outscored the Trojans 14-1 to go ahead 27-16 at halftime.
“I thought we did a better job of rebounding the ball in the second quarter, too,” D’Angelo said.
Then 6-4 junior forward Trevor Walsh scored seven and Schmitt had six in the third. Walsh converted from in close, pushing the lead to 40-20.
“I definitely think [our size] gives us a huge advantage, especially because most of our size is so versatile,” Schmitt said.
Konstantinos Walsh scored 15 for Garden City (4-2), a team with one starter back from a AA semifinal run. The Trojans got as close as 10 in the fourth.
“Everybody’s making a big deal about this playoff implication, but it’s one game in December,” coach James Hegmann said. “We’re going to get better . . . I have total faith in this group. They work hard. They love each other. It’s just one game. We had a bad day.”
Brian Heyman covers high school, college and pro sports. He joined Newsday in 2021 and previously worked as a sportswriter for The Journal News in White Plains and The Hudson Dispatch in Union City, New Jersey. His work has appeared in The New York Times, MLB.com and Baseball Digest magazine.
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