Wednesday, January 4, 2012

By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director

Cole Dorfman scored 16 of his 21 points in the second half for Pascack Hills, which erased a 14-0 deficit to post a 65-52 win over Rutherford.

MONTVALE – With the 'Cowboys Crazies' manning one corner of the home stands with their synchronized chants and rhythmic clapping, it figured that the gymnasium would have been a deafening place to be on Thursday night as the Pascack Hills boys basketball team came out to play its first home game of the season. But less than four minutes into the game, it was, as an opponents' cheering section might say, 'Awfully quiet.'

Rutherford walked into the corral and scored the game's first 14 points and led 17-2 at the 3:40 mark of the opening quarter, forcing the home crowd into temporary silence.

“They came out and missed one shot in the first quarter and we started not being able to hit anything,” said Pascack Hills head coach Kevin Kirkby, whose team missed its first seven shots from the field and had three of them blocked. “The first six minutes of the first quarter were certainly a wake up call for us. It was our first game at home and I was stunned that we came out the way we did.”

But by halftime, the crowd was back in it because its favorite team was back in it. Visibly wearing Rutherford down with its full-court man-to-man pressure, Pascack Hills was back even by the time the first half was over. The Cowboys kept the pedal to the metal in the second half, turning an early 15-point deficit into a 65-52 win in Montvale.

Rutherford's Kevin McGorry finished with a game-high 30.

As much as it was about Pascack Hills' ability to put the ball in the basket, the comeback was really spurred by the Cowboys' wind as they ran up and down the floor for the full 32 minutes while Rutherford had its hands on its knees not too long after Brian Kelly hit a free throw to cap the Bulldogs' 17-2 run to start the game.

“We are a team that really needs to push the ball no matter if it goes in, so that is what we started to do at the end of the first quarter and into the second quarter and we started to tire them out. That is how we got ourselves back in the game,” said Pascack Hills senior guard Jared Shill. “We run so much in practice and that is our goal, to just run all the time. We are trying to get opposing teams really tired.”

When Rutherford had its wind, it was on fire in the first quarter. Darien Panella sliced up the Pascack Hills press, getting to the basket at will and then camping out on the wing for open jumpshots. After Kevin McGorry, Rutherford's versatile 6-foot-6 center, made a three-pointer to opening the game's scoring on the first possession, Pannella scored four straight baskets, the first on a putback, the second on the fastbreak, the third on a 3-pointer from the wing and the last on a coast-to-coast sprint after grabbing a defensive rebound as Rutherford stormed out to a 12-0 lead just 2:51 into the game.

Jared Shill finished with 21 points for Pascack Hills, which improved to 4-2 on the season.

McGorry's tricky runner across the lane but Rutherford up 14-0. Pascack Hills got its first points on two Brian Horn free throws, but Rutherford answered with Brian Willis layup off a pass by McGorry from the high post and a Brian Kelly free throw to give the Bulldogs their largest lead of the game at 17-2 with still 3:40 to play in the opening quarter.

But lost in the fact that Rutherford was on pace to score 68 first half points was the fact that the tempo of the game was already well in Pascack Hills' favor. With one of the most experienced back courts in Bergen County led by Shill and Cole Dorfman, who are each playing their third varsity seasons, and Brian Horn, the Cowboys really had Rutherford right where they wanted them even if the scoreboard suggested the opposite.

“They had a shot blocker [McGorry], but we still had to go right at him to try to get him in foul trouble or tire him out. We couldn't just stay out of the middle because they had a big guy,” said Dorfman. “We didn't shoot it well early, but after every miss we just kept running and you could see it happening. They started huffin' and puffin'.”

Dorfman's end-to-end layup that beat the first quarter buzzer got Pascack Hills back to within 23-10, but its comeback would begin in earnest in the second quarter when Andrew Covner assisted on Chris Marini's backdoor cut that kicked off a 16-2 run that lasted the final 5:21 of the first half. A free throw by Dorfman and another by Shill picked off the final two points that the Cowboys needed to get all even at 28 by halftime.

Darien Pannella scored 11 of his 15 points during Rutherford's dominant first quarter.

“We wanted to control the tempo. We did not want to run with them. We did a good job of it in the first quarter, but in the second and third quarters we clearly did not,” said Rutherford head coach Ken Cavanagh. “With their quickness we knew that dribble penetration was going to be a problem. We tried to help away, but they still started to beat us to the basket a few times.”

Shill, who will play next season at Connecticut College, scored the first points of the third quarter on a baseline jumper and gave Pascack Hills its first lead of the night at 30-28 and Dorfman added a jumper from the wing on the next possession. Then, up 37-34 midway through the third, Pascack Hills Dorfman scored seven points in a 9-2 spurt that turned the game in the Cowboys favor for good. Two minutes into the fourth quarter Steve Thorworth scored on the fastbreak to completely flip the script as Pascack Hills, which trailed by 15 points in the first quarter, opened a 15-point advantage of its own at 52-37 and it was smooth sailing from there.

McGorry scored a game-high 30 for Rutherford and was a factor in every phase of the game. He had nine rebounds, three blocks and also helped bring the ball up the floor on occasion. Pannella scored 15 for the Bulldogs, 11 of them in the first quarter, but the Bulldogs only got two other field goals by other players, both by Willis in the first quarter. The real problem was turnovers, which have been plagued the Bulldogs at times during their 3-3 start to the season.

Andrew Kovner scored 6 points off the bench for Pascack Hills.

“We turned the ball over 32 times. It is hard to win any game at any level when you turn the ball over that much. That is 32 shots we didn't take,” said Cavanagh. “We didn't take care of the basketball and when we lost to Garfield in overtime we turned it over 26 times. We really have to start placing value on possessions because our shooting percentage was fine tonight, its just that we didn't get enough shots.”

By forcing the 32 turnovers, Pascack Hills got plenty of extra shots at the basket and Dorfman and Shill each finished tied for team high honors with 21 points. Marini added 7 points, Kovner had 6 and Thorworth and Horn each added 4 points for the Cowboys, who improved to 4-2 on the season. Pascack Hills losses this year came against Cresskill in the All Groups Holiday Tournament final and out of league against Kennedy and they are looking for success similar to last year when it won the North 1, Group 2 state sectional title and reached the quarterfinals of the Bergen County Jamboree.

“We have four kids who can handle the ball and make 3s on the court at all times and we haven't even started making our 3s consistently yet. I think the most we've made in a game is three and we had scrimmages where we made eight or nine,” said Kirkby, who is in his second season as Pascack Hills' head coach. “When that happens, we could be a very good team.”

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