Bonackers Win Holiday Classic
The East Hampton High School boys basketball team, which won the Eastern Long Island Approved Basketball Officials' Holiday Classic tournament, whose games were played at Suffolk Community College-Selden on Tuesday and Wednesday nights, are "ready for the league season," the Bonackers' coach, Bill McKee, said on the eve of the new year.
East Hampton dispatched Riverhead 69-49 in a first-round matchup, and prevailed 61-47 over Southampton in the championship game.
Brandon Kennedy-Gay, who led the Bonackers with 30 points the first night and 24 the second, was named the tourney's most valuable player. He and two of his teammates, Kyle McKee, a senior guard, as is Kennedy-Gay, and the sophomore point guard, Jack Reese, who with aplomb withstood Southampton's pressure, turning the ball over only twice in the final, were named to the all-tournament team.
"It was tied 27-27 at halftime," the elder McKee said, "and it was 47-45 us with about three minutes to go. After I'd called timeout, there were three critical loose balls and we made shots -- two 3s by Kennedy-Gay and a 2 -- off all of them. That was the game right there. All of a sudden, instead of being up by 2, we were up by 8."
One of East Hampton's goals going in was to keep the Mariners off the offensive boards, "and we did that to an extent," said McKee. "They had 10 offensive rebounds for the game, but only four in the second half, and they didn't score off any of them."
Southampton pressed man-for-man pretty much throughout the fray, but the team -- Reese especially -- withstood it. Conversely, the Bonackers "played good defense both nights," their coach said. "Holding Southampton, which is a good-shooting team, to 47 points is good."
Bridgehampton's Killer Bees didn't look like killers in their 65-42 loss to Southampton Tuesday, but redeemed themselves by defeating Riverhead 55-41 in the consolation game.
"It was a total turnaround for us," said the Bees' coach, Carl Johnson, who posited that his players had "got caught up in the hype in the opener. Southampton outplayed us in every phase of the game . . . they did to us what we usually do to other teams. They scored a lot of points in transition with steals and easy layups."
"We moved the ball better against Riverhead and our defense was much, much better," Johnson said.