The Macs headed to Riverdale on Saturday night to take on Skyline Conference foe Mount Saint Vincent. From the start, there was no doubt who the better team was. YU blew the game open in the first half, and ended up winning 102-73.
Bar Alluf scored the first five points for Yeshiva, as the Macs got out to a 7-3 lead. However, the Dolphins would respond with seven unanswered to take a three point lead. Ryan Turell would then score four consecutive points, including a dunk off of a Simcha Halpert toss, and found Caleb Milobsky underneath to give the Macs a 13-10 advantage. CMSV would take a timeout, but after Vinny Tavella’s beautiful spin move and layup, YU would go on a 12-0 run. After a Raiquis Harris jumper fell, Tyler Hod was fouled on a three-point attempt, and hit all of his free throws.
The Macs would continue their first half domination, as a Gabe Leifer and-one and four points by Turell brought Yeshiva’s lead to 20. After some back and forth action, Halpert hit his first three of the game. After a Leifer jumper, Kevin Bokor hit Turell with a beautiful pass while he was falling out of bounds. Turell dunked for the second time, and YU led 51-26. An Ofek and-one closed out the half, as the Macs held a 54-28 advantage and their largest lead of the game. At the break, Turell had 17 points on 6-9 shooting, while Leifer and Reef each had 9.
After the two teams traded buckets to start the second period, CMSV went on a 7-0 run, bringing the YU lead to 59-41. However, this is the closest the Dolphins would get in the second half. The Macs slowly extended their lead, and a Halpert three made it 72-48. A Turell three forced a Mount Saint Vincent timeout, but there was no coming back for the Dolphins. Reef would get a steal, and proceeded to throw down a dunk with a force which caused the backboard to no longer be a stable object. With the Macs up 79-54, Halpert would hit three 3’s on consecutive possessions; jumpers from Turell and Halpert would balloon the lead to 39. CMSV tried to fight back, but their efforts were for naught; when the buzzer sounded, the scoreboard read 102-73.
Turell led the way for the Macs, as his 31 points brings his season average to 26.8. Ryan also had 12 rebounds, five of which were offensive. Halpert added 17, as he shot 5-11 from behind the arc. Leifer muscled his way to 14 points and 12 boards. Reef and Alluf each had 11 points. For Mount Saint Vincent, Raiquis Harris scored 31, on 13-27 shooting. No other player for the Dolphins had more than 11 points.
With the win, Yeshiva improves to 5-1, and 1-0 in the Skyline Conference. CMSV is now 0-4, and 0-1 in conference play.
How well did the Macs execute?
The three keys to the game were “Stop middle drive,” “Don’t force anything on offense,” and “Box out.” When it came to stopping the Dolphins from driving down the middle, the Macs were very good tonight. On a few occasions, they were beaten down the middle; a couple of these were on nice moves by CMSV players. However, YU typically walled off the middle, and only allowed baseline drives to the hoop. On a couple of occasions, a Macs’ guard was beat on one dribble. This is still something to work on, but Yeshiva did a pretty good job tonight.
YU’s offense was working to perfection today, as the Macs shot 56.9% from the field. On a couple of occasions, they did force shots, but for the vast majority of the game, when the Macs didn’t get a good scoring opportunity in transition, they reversed the ball and took their time. This often led to open shots and clear lanes to drive to the hole.
For the game, the Dolphins had 12 offensive rebounds. However, most of these were on weird tips and caroms, and not because the Macs were failing to box out. Tonight, the YU players did a good job at finding a body to box out, and this led to very few easy second chance opportunities for the Dolphins. Overall, the Macs executed extremely well tonight, and it showed on the scoreboard.
The Macs next game will be on Tuesday night, against Old Westbury. For Old Westbury, this will be a revenge game, as the Macs defeated the Panthers three times last year, including in the Skyline semis. If you can’t make it to the game, make sure to watch our broadcast. Tip off is at 8 PM.
Comments