Coach Apache Paschall refers to it as the toughest girls basketball league in the country, and there's no reason to doubt him at this point.
Brooklyn/Queens Division I of the Catholic High School Athletic Association was already robust.
Christ the King (Middle Village) has been a national powerhouse literally for decades now and is the defending state Federation Class AA champion. And
Mary Louis Academy (Jamaica),
Bishop Ford (Brooklyn),
Bishop Kearney (Brooklyn),
Archbishop Molloy (Queens) and
Bishop Loughlin (Brooklyn) can generally hang tough with anyone in the tri-state region on any given night.
Now, add to that the new contender in the neighborhood. St. Michael Academy in Manhattan closed its doors last spring for financial reasons, and most of the basketball team followed Paschall to
Nazareth (Brooklyn) High.
Nazareth, which had not fielded a team for several seasons, made its Brooklyn/Queens Division I debut last week in a 74-58 victory vs. Bishop Ford, and then improved to 2-0 with a 51-47 triumph at Christ the King on Saturday.
Bianca Cuevas scored 16 points and Syracuse University recruit Tiffany Jones added 15 to pace the winners, who made 15 of 20 free throws in the fourth quarter to hold off the Royals six days after missing 16 free throws during a win over Bishop Ford.
Virginia-bound guard Bria Smith scored 22 points and forward Nia Oden (Illinois) added 15 for Christ the King, which has lost in its league only three times in the last 11 seasons.
BOYS BASKETBALL: ALL-STATE GUARD SUSPENDED*
Christ the King (Middle Village) guard
Corey Edwards will sit out until January as punishment
for an in-school infraction. Edwards, a George Mason recruit who was a
second-team all-state pick as a junior, did not play in CTK's 71-67
victory over Thomas Jefferson at the Christ the King Invitational.
*
This one's disheartening if you were a fan rooting for the "little guy"
in the 1980s and ‘90s: Mattituck built a 52-16 lead through three
quarters and thumped Bridgehampton by a 72-26 final the other night. As
New York basketball diehards know, the Bridgies own eight NYSPHSAA Class
D championships (tied for the state lead with Mount Vernon) from
1978-98 despite typically having the smallest enrollment of all the
teams reaching Glens Falls.
Further declines in enrollment have
left the Suffolk County school a shell of its former self, and there are
rumblings every few years that the district will either merge with a
neighbor or at least tuition-out its high school students to other
districts.
CROSS COUNTRY: FAYETTEVILLE-MANLIUS GIRLS AT THEIR FINESTFayetteville-Manlius (Manlius) won its fifth straight girls championship in the Nike Cross Nationals in Portland, Ore., on Saturday and set a record in the process.
F-M finished with just 27 points, easily breaking the record of 51 set by New York archrival
Saratoga Springs in the inaugural meet in 2004. Beginning with Saratoga and Hilton (2005), New York teams have won the girls race all seven years.
Saratoga (104) finished second to F-M for the second straight year. Two-time NXN runner-up Saugus (Calif.), placed third at 117.
North Shore (Glen Head) was ninth at 267 after earning a wild-card berth following a third-place showing in the New York regional qualifier.
Plano (Texas) senior Rachel Johnson was the individual champion in 18 minutes, 18.6 seconds on a muddy course, followed by Fayetteville-Manlius junior Christie Rutledge in 18:21.4 to begin an avalanche of five Hornets runners in the top 29. Katie Sischo was fourth in 18:49.7, followed by Jillian Fanning (18:51.7) in sixth, Heather Martin in 16th and Courtney Chapman in 29th.
Rutledge led for more than half the race before giving way to Johnson, who placed sixth in the 2009 meet.
A year ago, Rutledge was F-M's No. 7 runner — on the junior varsity.
"She's a Cinderella story of monumental proportions," coach Bill Aris told The Post-Standard. "She worked, she stayed healthy, she put in the time, she improved, and bang, it all paid off."
The race was run in temperatures hovering near 40 degrees and winds gusting to 25 mph.
Arcadia (Calif.) brought home the boys title with 92 points to hold off Fayetteville-Manlius (135) and six other teams that came in at under 200 points. Shaker was 13th with 325 points in another strong New York showing.
Lukas Verzbicas from Illinois was the leading boys finisher in 15:59.2. Mark McGurrin led F-M in 16:45.4 for 17th place.
TRACK AND FIELD: CARDOZO SENIOR STOPPED BY ILLNESSCardozo (Oakland Gardens) track star Ahtyana Johnson was diagnosed in September with aplastic anemia, a condition in which the body stops producing sufficient blood cells, leading to fatigue and increased risk of infections, The New York Post reported.
The senior quarter-mile specialist knew something was amiss when she started training for the cross country season. She experienced dizziness and unexplained fatigue and was treated in a hospital for five days. She's on medication now and isn't in the clear yet, meaning she might face the prospect of a bone marrow transplant.
Johnson helped Cardozo to PSAL indoor and outdoor titles and was the second leg of their national championship 1,600-meter relay, which also triumphed at the Millrose Games. She ran the state's No. 2 time in the 400 both indoors and outdoors with marks of :55.02 and :54.17, respectively.
John Schiano, who has written about high school sports in western and central New York for more than 25 years, covers New York for MaxPreps. He may be reached at johnschianosports@gmail.com.
