You could pretty much pencil it in every single year. St. Raymond and Rice would meet in the CHSAA Archdiocesan championship game. With just four ‘AA’ teams in the Archdiocese, there was little chance for the two superpowers to slip up.
“It was almost elementary who was gonna play at Mount,” St. Ray’s coach Oliver Antigua said of the venue for the diocesan final.
No longer is that the case – and not just because Rice closed in June due to financial reasons.
The New York Archdiocesan tournament has undergone a facelift. Four teams – Cardinal Hayes, Mount St. Michael, Archbishop Stepinac and Fordham Prep – moved up this year from the ‘A’ and are participating in the tourney, making it much more comparable to its CHSAA Brooklyn/Queens counterpart. With six teams from The Bronx and Westchester and two teams from Staten Island, there was a full eight-team bracket similar to B/Q’s six-team setup.
“I always thought that in Brooklyn our tournament was a little bit better than theirs,” said Paul Gilvary, coach of Holy Cross and CHSAA basketball chairman. “It became very predictable almost. I think by expanding it to eight teams, it makes for a better tournament.”
Gilvary has compared the diocesan tournaments now to a college conference tournament in advance of the NCAA tournament, which of course would be the CHSAA Class AA intersectional playoffs.
The Archdiocesan tournament started Sunday with the quarterfinals and will continue Tuesday back at St. Raymond with two semifinal grudge matches – No. 1 Cardinal Hayes against No. 4 St. Raymond and No. 2 St. Peter’s versus No. 3 Mount St. Michael.
Hayes and Mount are both diocesan tournament neophytes and they both have a chance to meet Saturday at Mount St. Michael for the championship. Not bad for a tournament that used to feature the two same teams in the finals almost exclusively.
“This is a big step for us,” Mount senior Anthony Maestre said. “We always wanted this. Since last year we’ve been talking about it. It’s a beautiful thing.”
Antigua noted that Sunday there were a bunch of college coaches – at all levels – in his gym for the quarterfinals. That’s another reason why the CHSAA intends to continue this expanded diocesan tournament format, according to Gilvary.
“I don’t really see a downside to it,” Gilvary said.
Hayes-Ray’s to meet again: The last time St. Raymond and Cardinal Hayes met, Hayes routed its Bronx rival, 84-58. With the two set to play in the CHSAA Archdiocesan semifinals 6 p.m. Tuesday night at St. Ray’s, Ravens coach Oliver Antigua said he’ll talk about the previous meeting very little with his players.
“No statements,” he said. “No motivation. It’s the time of year you’re supposed to play to win the games. I’m not giving speeches. I’m not giving rah rah. It’s about playing the best.”
Of course, St. Ray’s has already spoken at length about the disappointing loss, Antigua said. The Ravens have watched the video. They saw everything they did wrong. And it helped them a lot, the coach said, in two big wins last week over PSAL powerhouses Lincoln and Boys & Girls.
“We use that to show how not to play,” said Antigua, whose team defeated All Hallows, 67-50, in the quarterfinals on Sunday. “That’s helped us in these tough games that we’ve played. We definitely took something from the loss.”
Hayes coach Joe Lods joked Sunday after his team defeated Fordham Prep in the quarterfinals that the Ravens’ wins over the Brooklyn squads should come with an “asterisk” because they were each missing key players. He said that his team has the edge because St. Raymond has to look across the court and see the team that handed it a “25-point drubbing.”
The winner of Tuesday’s game gets a huge lift in the intersectional playoffs: a bye into the quarterfinals, which Antigua has likened to a double bye.
“Huge in terms of the path you have to take,” he said. “We all talk about winning, getting hot at the right time. But it could be very difficult if you face a tough opponent in the quarterfinals.”
There will certainly be a tough one Tuesday. St. Ray’s will undoubtedly be looking for some revenge.
“I expect us to come to play,” Antigua said.
Sophomore leading red-hot Packer: Packer Collegiate, with 16 straight wins and the regular season ACIS title in its back pocket, is enjoying its finest season in eight years, since winning the ACIS crown during the 2003-04 campaign. The Pelicans’ success is somewhat unlikely as it graduated five senior starters last year off a team that finished fourth in the ACIS.
“It’s a surprise,” assistant coach Perry Licata said. “We weren’t sure what we were going to have coming into the season. The season started off a little rocky, but things came around after the first six or seven games.”
That’s around when Ethan Feldman began to thrive, after losses to Fieldston, Dalton and ACIS rival Friends Seminary. The 6-foot-2 sophomore began feeling comfortable as Packer’s leading scorer and he has since taken off, averaging a team-high 22 points per game. He poured in 41 points in a big win over ISAL champion Columbia Prep, last year’s NYSAISAA Class C champ, and 31 as Packer (19-3) exacted revenge against Friends. Feldman came off the bench as a freshman and averaged eight points per game.
“He’s a great shooter,” Licata said. “He shoots 3-pointers, he shoots 15-footers. … Right away from the beginning of the season we knew he was the man, we knew he was gonna be our leading scorer. We didn’t think he was gonna score as much as he has.”
That’s not to say Feldman has excelled on his own. Junior point guard Elie Roman runs the show, senior forward Nick Morton is a four-year contributor and wing Jake Shapiro is also a key to the team at both ends of the floor.
“We play 10 guys, we play great defense and we score a lot more points [63 points per game] this year,” Licata said.
Packer, a small private school in Brooklyn Heights, will be the top seed in the ACIS playoffs, which begins Saturday. Barring something unforeseen, the Pelicans will be involved in the NYSAISAA Class C tournament.
“I expect us to be in that final game if we play like we know can,” the assistant coach said. “I’m hoping we can win the whole thing.”
