D8 Senior: St. Mary's Holds off Rez in Battle Between Top Teams

Up by 20 points midway through the third quarter on Wednesday afternoon, you'd think that the St. Mary's Eagles had the Resurrection Phoenix put away.

Though they held the Phoenix off in the fourth quarter, Resurrection did make things interesting for those in attendance over at SMHS.

Resurrection trimmed the deficit to 17 points heading into the fourth, and, with a flurry of offensive activity, including three threes combined from Andrew Mwangi (2) and John Moi (1), cut the Eagle lead down to 5 points with 2:00 to go in the game.

A Rez turnover and SMHS basket on the other end, though, put this one in the win column for St. Mary's.  They would win by a 70-61 final, which is interesting in itself because the Phoenix won the earlier meeting by 10 --- meaning SMHS had to win by 11 or more on Wednesday to take the tiebreak (and likely first place in the D8 standings).  They had a chance in the waning seconds but a last ditch attempt was off the mark.

The Eagles had four players in double figures --- Alex Thompson (18), Adam Voll (15), Isaac Lance (13) and Henry Bankazo (12).

Resurrection was led by Mike Pereira, who continued his excellent play as of late with a game-high 22 points.  Cory Kenning netted 13, Andrew Mwangi 10 (again off the bench as he comes back from injury) and John Moi 7 for Rez.

In the junior end of the doubleheader, the St. Mary's junior Eagles are still unbeaten (exhibition/league/tournament) on the season after a 70-43 pounding of Resurrection.  SMHS pumped home 50 points in the first half, and led 50-26 at recess before cruising home in the final sixteen minutes.


Senior Mini Boxscore


RCSS     12-13-15-21 = 61
SMHS    19-15-23-13 = 70

RCSS (FG, FT-A, PTS)
Rodrigues 0 1-2 1, Gibbs 0 0-0 0, Pereira 10 2-2 22, Schneider 0 4-4 4, Kenning 6 1-2 13, Mwangi 4 0-0 10, Moi 2 2-2 7, Cordle 1 1-1 3, Chris 0 1-2 1, Keil 0 0-0 0.

Free-Throws:  12-15 (.800).  Three-Point Goals, 3 (Mwangi 2, Moi 1).


SMHS (FG, FT-A, PTS)
Lance 3 5-5 13, Kasunic 2 1-3 5, Thompson 6 4-7 17, B. Bankazo 1 0-0 2, Hannah 2 0-0 4, H. Bankazo 4 2-4 12, Voll 6 3-3 15, #10 0 1-2 1, Huynh 0 0-0 0.

Free-Throws:  16-22 (.727).  Three-Point Goals, 6 (Lance 2, Thompson 2, H. Bankazo 2).