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Bobcats slip past North Country

Saints Stanley Gaima (20) and Wilkins Desulme chase Bobcats’ point guard Kevin Dicola during the second half of Tuesday’s game. Dicola scored a game-high 30 point to lead his team to victory. (Enterprise photo — Lou Reuter)

SARANAC LAKE — With just six players eligible for the first game of the second semester, the North Country Community College men’s basketball team faced an uphill battle when it hosted Bryant and Stratton of Syracuse on Tuesday.

The half dozen Saints who did step on their court put up a fight, but came up short as the Bobcats claimed a 95-85 victory. NCCC led 41-39 at intermission and stayed close throughout much of the second half until falling victim to fatigue and some hot shooting by the Bobcats’ sophomore point guard Kevin Dicola, who scored 23 of his game-high 30 points after halftime.

The Saints rallied back from double-digit deficits in both halves, and trailed by just four points with 1:05 remaining in the game, but a technical foul and five successful free throws by Bryant and Stratton in the waning seconds sealed the Saints fate.

“Our guys played outstanding. They did everything we asked,” Saints head coach Daryl Crist said ” I think we probably ran out of gas a little bit in the second half. It’s tough to manage the six until we get some help hopefully, but they gave full effort, which is what we wanted. They executed.

“It was tough at the end because we were right there,” Crist continued. “We were down four with the ball with a minute and change left, we come out of a timeout and were called with a technical.”

Ty’Shawn Spruill skys above Bobcats Hakeem Ali, Tim Rouse (3) and Xavier Norgbey to score during the second half. (Enterprise photo — Lou Reuter)

All six of NCCC’s players scored in double figures, and Wilkins Desulme led the way with 22 points, scoring 11 in each half.

The Saints took the court with an all-freshmen lineup. Point guard Zach Rice-Gordon scored 16 points, Bryce Roseborough tossed in 13, Stanley Gaima added 12 points, and Ty Spruill and Matthew Acosta chipped in 11 points each.

Spruill, a big freshman from Baltimore, Maryland was playing his first game for the Saints, and he got into foul trouble early, which hampered his ability to be aggressive on defense down the stretch. Spruill was whistled for three fouls before the intermission and played most of the second half with four fouls. The Saints played the final 7:19 of the game without a substitute after Acosta fouled out of the contest.

The Bobcats are competing as a first-year program, and they came up big from long range and at the free throw line on the way to picking up their third win of the season. Bryant and Stratton knocked down 14 three-pointers in the game, with Dicola draining half of them, including six after intermission. The Bobcats also sank 21 of their 27 foul shots attempted.

“In the first half, we climbed out fast on them,” said Bryant and Stratton head coach Dan Frisina. “Our defense led some pretty good offense, but I knew that they were going to come back. They are strong team, well coached. I told our guys when we were down two going into halftime, ‘They made their run, it’s time to go back in there and make our run.’ If we do what we do best, we’ll be okay.

Stanley Gaima of the Saints hauls down a rebound over Bryant and Stratton’s Hakeem Ali during Tuesday’s game. (Enterprise photo — Lou Reuter)

“They came in shorthanded,” Frisina added. “We have, obviously, more guys, fresher legs, so we tried to use that to our advantage as much as possible. We pressed them, one of their guys cramped up, and their bigger guys got into foul trouble. Numbers worked in our favor at the end.”

Crist said Dicola, who formerly played at Onondaga, was the big factor in the second half.

“It think they shot it in the second half, and he carried them,” Crist said. “We didn’t locate him in our zones. They played hard. They played well. To be able to come in here and play that well, all the credit to them. It was a good game.”

Eight players scored points for the Bobcats. Jerry Saintelus and Xavier Norgbey both hit for double figures in the win, scoring 19 and 16 points, respectively.

Crist and his team will be dealing with a numbers issue again as they enter their next two road games with the same six players. They next face Schenectady on Thursday and travel to Cayuga on Monday. Crist hopes to have up to five players back in the lineup when they return home on Wednesday to host Herkimer Community College.

“I’m happy. The guys did great,” Crist said. “Hopefully this prepares us for the region, which starts Thursday. It was a good game to get started and see where we’re at. You want to win, but now we’re ready for region where we’re ultimately trying to win and get to the tournament at the end of the year.”

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