NORTHEAST PHILADELPHIA –
After finding themselves down by double digits multiple times in the fourth quarter, Amin Bryant and Izaiah Brockington led a valiant comeback attempt for Archbishop Ryan, but in the end it wasn’t enough.
Quade Green scored 30 points along with eight assists and Dhamir Cosby-Roundtree added 15 points, 12 rebounds, and three blocks, as Neumann-Goretti was able to stave off the Raiders on their way to a 69-64 victory at Archbishop Ryan.
The Raiders faced a 60-51 deficit with just 2:40 remaining in the contest, and were able to cut their deficit to 66-63 with 35 seconds remaining, but Green continued to come up clutch at the charity stripe for the Saints to shut the door on any comeback attempt.
“It all started with defense, we knew we had to make stops to get back in the game,” Bryant said. “If we got stops on defense, we could get back to being aggressive on offense to help us make a comeback.”
Bryant (14 points, 6 rebounds) and Brockington (24 points) did all they could in the fourth quarter as they combined for 15 of the Raiders 24 points in the quarter. Both were relentless in attacking the rim and getting to the foul line, but probably weren’t as efficient at the line as they would have liked.
Brockington went 5-9 at the charity stripe and Bryant went 6-11. Overall, the Raiders finished 13-23 at the line compared to the Saints who finished 15-18 from the line.
In the first half, both teams committed a lot of turnovers, which led to a low scoring half, as the Saints went into the break with a 25-24 lead. Green had eight points and four assists at the half and Cosby-Roundtree had 10 points and six rebounds. Brockington and Matiss Kulackovskis were leading the Raiders with nine each.
Green was more of a facilitator in the first half, as he didn’t score his first bucket of the game until the 3:30 mark of the second quarter. But, in the second half he scored 22 points and showed why he is one of the best guards in the country. He showed off his handles and great finishing ability in the lane, as he had several finishes at the rim that had even the Ryan crowd showing respect.
“In the first half they were hedging hard on screens hard so I got my teammates involved, in hope of stopping the double teams on me in the second half,” Green said. “And I didn’t see as many double teams in the second half so I started taking over.”
Green was very efficient in the game as he scored his 30 points on 10-13 from the field and 10-12 from the line. Overall the Saints were very efficient, as the team finished 26-38 from the field. While they were efficient on the offensive side of the ball, their defense also did a good job in keeping one of the Raiders best players, Matiss Kulackovskis, in check.
Kulackovskis is a great inside/outside threat and came in averaging 17 points a game this season, but the Saints held him to just 13 points on 5-16 shooting from the field.
Neumann-Goretti point guard, Quade Green, totaled 30 points in win vs. Ryan - photo by Zamani Feelings
“Coach told us to press up on him, not let him dribble, and not let him have any easy catches coming off of screens,” Cosby-Roundtree said.
Neumann-Goretti will be back in action on Monday when they take on Bishop McDevitt at home. Archbishop Ryan will have their next PCL game on Sunday when they go on the road to take on Bonner-Prendergast.