It wasn’t beautiful, but it was effective.
On a Saturday afternoon in the Rye High School gym where Garnet buckets were harder to come by than warm days in Westchester, Rye passed its most important test of the season, beating Nyack 43-34 in the first round of the Section 1 Class AA tournament.
“Somehow, like we always do, we were able to find another gear defensively in that second half,” said Rye coach Tom Proudian. “When we play great defense, we win games. Holding a very good Nyack team to just 13 second-half points – and only three points in the fourth quarter – was pretty good for us.”
Trailing 12-11 after one quarter and 23-19 at the half, Rye needed to flip any switch that was switchable to ramp up its defense.
Unflappable senior swing man Sebastian Lewis knew what had to be done.
“I was telling my teammates at halftime not to worry, that we would be fine,” he said. “I have so much confidence in the guys on this team that I knew even if our shots weren’t falling, that we’re gonna play our butts off and fight our way back into this game. Years ago, I used to get nervous before big games. That doesn’t happen anymore.”
The correct switch did indeed get flipped.
As the Garnets – and their loyal fans – started to exhale just a bit, their shots finally started to fall.
With two RedHawks all over him, junior Ben Hudson drove fearlessly into the lane with 2:30 to play. He was fouled, but made the bucket for a 36-31 Rye advantage. When he missed the and-one, Rye gobbled up the rebound, and kicked it right back to Hudson, who was able to reset the offense with a fresh shot clock.
One minute later, senior captain Carson Miller drained a HUGE three to make it 39-31, and the rest was elementary.
Rye travels Wednesday to Chappaqua to face No. 4 Horace Greeley in the quarterfinals, a rematch of the teams’ third game of the season, which the Quakers won 68-58 on Dec. 18.
