March
7, 2007
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Tyler Nash led Passaic Valley with 18 points as the Hornets knocked off Wayne Valley, 60-48, to claim the school's first ever State sectional title. |
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WAYNE -- There are two ways that a team can counter a zone defense. For one, it can work the ball around the perimeter, hoping that a player gets hot from the outside as time whittles away on the game clock. Passaic Valley tried that approach in the first two quarters against Wayne Valley on Tuesday night in the North 1, Group 3 State sectional final and the result was a yawner of a first half in which the Hornets scored only 18 points and held a slim three-point lead.
The other way to approach a zone defense is to attack it, to exploit its seams, get it to collapse and then pass the ball off to wide open players in vacated areas. That is what Passaic Valley point guard Joe Castro did in the second half and he put on a clinic.
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| PV forced Wayne Valley's Charlie Rigoglioso to work for all of his team high 18 points. |
Castro had eight of his 11 assists in the third quarter, including dropping the dime on three straight possessions during one stretch, as the Hornets pulled away to a 60-48 win and the State sectional championship at Passaic County Tech.
“Our coach [Rob Carcich] told us at halftime how to attack the 1-3-1 because that was giving us a little problem and we came out and executed,” said Castro. “We just really got our confidence in the third quarter. We started putting pressure on them and they just cracked.”
Castro’s set up Damian Dilorio on the fast break to open the third quarter scoring, a basket that gave PV a 20-15 lead and was a sign of things to come. Castro had a steal and an assist on Tyler Nash’s basket midway through the third and then he got busy dealing in the halfcourt.
In the span of 2:01 and all inside the set offense, Castro threw a back-side lob that Shane Lebiedy dropped in uncontested; he split the top of the zone with dribble penetration and set up Lebiedy for another easy layup then did it again with 2:02 left in the period. That last time he got to the middle and found Lebiedy on the baseline for another wide open look and that layup gave Passaic Valley a 38-29 lead.
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| Joe Castro carved up the Wayne Valley zone in the second half, finishing with 17 points and 11 assists. |
Castro closed the third quarter scoring in style, breaking down the defense off the dribble one more time for a layup that put Passaic Valley up 43-32 and WV never got back within single digits.
“When you have guards like Tyler [Nash] and Joey, they just create so many things that I can’t even draw up,” said Carcich, who is in his fourth season as the PV head coach. “We overloaded against that 1-3-1, put the ball in Joey’s hands and told him to attack it. I pointed out where the open lanes would be and I think he found every one of them.”
While the Hornets were having their way on the offensive end, Wayne Valley, which plays a more deliberate style, was being forced to work for every open shot. Charlie Rigoglioso was expending a lot of energy off the ball, running around multiple screens before even getting a touch the ball.
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| Wayne Valley's Arber Zuberi fighting for space inside against Passaic Valley's 2-3 zone. |
To his credit, when he did find space Rigoglioso knocked down shots. He made five five-three pointers and finished with a team-high 18 points, but the Indians couldn’t find another consistent scoring option to force PV to turn its focus elsewhere.
“We wanted to make sure that we knew where [Rigoglioso] was at all times,” said Carcich, of the defensive scheme. “We knew a couple of their other kids were going to hit some threes here and there, but we didn’t know if they were going to be able consistent enough to keep them close the whole way.”
They weren’t and PV also did a solid job on Wayne Valley’s interior players with its own zone, a 2-3 matchup with man-to-man tendencies. The Indians had the height advantage, but their post players -- Arber Zuberi, Chris Pantale and Jimmy Monahan – combined for just 18 points.
Nash led Passaic Valley with 18 points, Castro had 17 and Passaic Valley, one of the worst boys basketball programs in the state just four years ago, is now one of the best in North Jersey.
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| Jon Coral hit a three-pointer with 1:05 to go in the third quarter to give PV a 41-29 lead. |
In the season before Carcich took over, the Hornets had finally broken a 40-game losing streak. On Tuesday night, they could call themselves State sectional champions for the first time in school history.
“I remember one of the first practices I had with the kids in my first year, I asked a senior, a captain named Chris Nagy, in front of everybody, ‘What do you think would be a successful season this year?’ He said eight wins, so that is what we were battling,” said Carcich, whose team improved to 20-8 on the season and will play Colonia in the Group 3 State semifinals on Thursday. “When I asked them that same question this year they said 24 wins, a little bit unrealistic but it does show the difference.”
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