Canton 53, Gouverneur 37, In Canton on Friday evening.
On Friday evening the Canton Golden Bear JV Hoopers continued their winning ways downing the Gouverneur Wildcats by a score of 53 to 37 moving to 8-1 on the year. The game began with both teams frantically defending, applying a tremendous amount of pressure on respective ball handlers. The Bears won quarter one by a slim 11-6 margin, despite a clear lack of energy and poor free throw shooting, going 3 for 9 from the line. Needless the say, the lack of energy resulted in a halftime score knotted at 19. Having not played since the Burkman Championship game it was clear the team needed to shake the dust off.
The third quarter played out similar to the first half with each team trading baskets, and many turnovers. Some fantastic shooting by 8th grader Zadok Roiger and inside play by sophomore Griffen Scafidi-McGuire kept the Bears close as they lead by one point at the end of the quarter 32-31. Following a rather stern talking to by varsity coach Troy Lassial the boys responded by dominating quarter 4. The intense pressure by Charlie Todd, Ethan Francey, Paul Redfern, Roiger, Jake Backus, Talan Green and McGuire was too much for the Cats to handle. As the Bears forced multiple turnovers with their pressure, resulting in run-out lay-ups and much better offensive production. By the end of the game the cats were able to hang 6 total points in quarter 4 compared to the 21 by the young Bears.
A career high 19 points by Zadok Roiger was complimented by another career high 9 points by Griffen Scafidi-McGuire. Another 13 from Ethan Francey, 5 by Todd, 4 by Backus and 3 by Talan Green and Lucas Howie completed the Bears scoring with 1. High scorers for the Cats included Kaleb Platt with 10 points, Brodie Burns with 8 and Cael Denesha with 6.
Coach Porter commented, “It was good for our guys to figure out how to find a way to win. Despite a shaky start, we hung on in the face of a very well coached and hungry Wildcat team. We learned a lot from this game. If we can take care of the ball better and not commit 22 turnovers, we may be able to win some future games as well. I was very pleased with Griffen as he came in to replace Jackson Ames was not able to play today. That was probably Griff’s best offensive outing. I also like how our bench enthusiasm kept us going! We have a great group of guys from top to bottom who will be fun to watch in the future if they keep working.”
The Bears travel to Carthage on Wednesday evening for a non-league match-up beginning at 5:30.
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