January 5th games

When you take a look at the games for Tuesday Jan. 5th it's as if the schedule makers knew hoop fans were going to come off a 1 week layoff and a painful blustery winter storm. Here's the reward for enduring winter pain and the layoff:

Alvrine at West: Alvrine still trying to figure out the rotation. West once again being better than people thought they were going to be. It'll be Alvrine's size against West's athleticism.

Dover at North: A matchup of 2 of the best backcourts in the state. Burt+AlDarraji vs Gauthier+Williams. This will be a great test of the young talented Titan backcourt vs an experienced backcourt. For North to pull off the upset it might come down to their frontcourt players to produce.

Merrimack at Exeter: This is a stearn test for the Tomohawk Railroad to get on track for 2010. This game will be tight from start to finish. 2 very good backcourts going at each other. If you look at the box score the next morning Watson's amount of points might be the difference between Merrimack getting their first loss or win of the new year.

South at Londonderry: This is a pick em game, but south might have the upper hand. Their young backcourt played well in the Nashua Holiday tournament. Londonderry will be an up and down team heading into the new year.

Salem at Pinkerton: This is a very interesting matchup. These are 2 teams that will jockey for positions in the 6th to 10th seeds or if one of these teams start accumulating big wins, like this game, they could break through to the top 5. This is one of the games I would want to attend.

Trinity at Winny: Trinity's young replacements for Hayden will get thrown into the Ryan Dunn fire down in the seacoast. Winny has a chance to pull off the upset. Madol has to lead the way for the Pioneers to have a happy bus ride home.

Unfortunately, I can't attend one of the premium Class L games tomorrow night due to basketball duties, but I hope we get reports on some if not all of these matchups from our registered users. If you're not registered and want to give some good insight to the hardcourt action, then by all means sign up and start posting. If I was going to a game Tuesday night it would be between the Pinkerton - Salem game and North - Dover. These are 2 really intriguing matchups. I would really be anxious to see the North backcourt go against the Dover backcourt. I would also like to see the 1-2 punch of Mathieu and Proulx for Pinkerton go up against Gallant/LaRosa and company. Sometimes, when I'm heading out in the car I have no idea where I'm going until the last minute. When faced with Rte 28 to Pinkerton or head to Rte 3 for North, then I make the decision.

Not to get ahead of myself, but I'll be faced with another decision on Friday Jan 8th. I have it narrowed down to Memorial at Pinkerton or Pelham at Milford. I went to last year's Milford at Pelham game in Feb. and it was one of the best games I saw all year. Pelham won 70 - 67 with Hojlo and Spirou combining for 50 points. Handanovic, Holder and Mike O combined for 50 also. It had tournament atmosphere and a tournament crowd. Maybe, I just talked myself into going to Milford on Friday.

Hello Mr. Mitchell, what's the specials at the Pasta Loft in Milford this Friday? This could tip the balance as to where my car turns when it's on the highway Friday evening.

Not sure what the specials are but I would suggest Boneless Buffalo tenders and beer. Please come dressed appropriately as I will be doing a fashion update for those visitors from outside of the class I element.

Will there be a film crew taping for a new reality TV show in the Milford gym? If so, I'll try to bump it up a notch with my wardrobe. I didn't know there was a Class I Element. It sounds like something from the world of Avatar and it sounds kind of eerie...... The Class I Element.

Actually plenty of film to go around with the local Milford public channel filming,the team filming the game and myself for our team website. So behave nicely, everyone will be watching.

I guess Big Brother and Big Sister are watching things in Milford.

How I see some of the more interesting games tonight:

Dover at North is indeed a intriguing matchup. I think Dover has emerged from the holiday hangover as the favorites in Class L. I would not put a lot of stock in a Holiday tourney win, but it certainly doesn't hurt, and they're feeling much better about themselves than Alvrine or Milford probably is. I love Alex Pratt's game for North, but the big question is can Javon Williams stay on the floor, play solid defense (without fouling) and contribute offensively. They'll need a big game from Williams, Pratt form outside and Trevor Rancourt at the SF position. For Dover, its obviously Alex Burt, but I don't think they live and die by Burt (one reason I think they're for real), they've go Kenaan Al-Darraji complimenting Alex's game, and Rory Duffy and Morgan Faustino playing very well too. I expect Dover to win, but if North puts things together could make fore a very exciting game in Nashua.

Trinity visiting Winnacunnet is another good game waiting to happen. No Kyle Ratcliff this season means Harry Knowles, Ryan Dunn and Jesse Gould (amongst others) need to step up and fill the scoring void, and most notably the defensive hole in the middle. I've always thought Jay McKenna is one of the most underrated coaches in Class L, often times getting the most out of his players and defeating more superior teams. For Trinity, I'll be interested to see if Mr. Madol is really the "best" player in Class L I've heard and seen him ranked at around the web. Will Phil Hayden play? Can Duffy and Stevens pick up the slack. I think the Hayden question is probably the biggest for the Pioneers, he's their floor general, and when he went down in the QCIBT I think it changed the dynamic of their team (just speculation I wasn't there).

So should be a great night of hoops, hope you all can get out there and report back on what you see, give us some thoughts on how the game went, individuals played and of course, how good the officiating was. We have about 40 users signed up - but only a core of 5-10 or so posting, lets hear what you peeps think about this season so far!

A great game that went into ot, with trinity winning by 3.
The key to the game was hayden , dressed in street clothes for the 1st 3 qtrs, coming into the game in the final minutes of the 4th.
Many missed free throws in the later part of the game could have iced it for either team.
Steve Cronan made a layup and was fouled to put winny up for the first time all game with 10-15 seconds left in regulation, and missed the freethrow .
Hayden took the ball right at the basket, with winny players all around him, missed the shot but the ball came right to him for the open layup to tie it
david madol played an ok game, thought Duffley had a better game.
Harry Knowles played his best game in two years.
Winny plays a very scrappy game, with in your face swarming defense.
The only ref problems i saw tonight, was the vey tall Trinity kid constantly having his hand in the net or hitting the net on shots.
none of these were called goaltending

Pinkerton 53 Salem 35.
Both teams did what they wanted defensively with Salem collasping on Mathieu and Pinkerton running different guy at LaRosa every two minutes. 20 to 20 at half time. Only difference was Pinkerton had two players step up (Patrikus and Proulx) both scoring arond 16 or 18 each. Mathieu was held to 4 points not really even taking many shots. Larosa somewhere around 10. Lorenz shot well for Salem (14ish?). Neither teams best game...

It looks like it was a very interesting evening. Dover gets a solid win at North. Pinkerton has a statement game in defeating Salem. The team, with the biggest question mark in my opinion - Alvrine gets upset at West and only scores 39 points. What do you think Asst? Is the rotation at Alvrine still trying to be figured out? Add some more question marks to the Broncos. Merry wins a tight one over Exeter. Memorial can't hit any shots and only scores 18 points in the 1st half vs. Concord, but comes back to win 51 - 34. Londonderry gets an important W over South.

Let's get to the interesting stuff:
Hayden is in street clothes for 3 periods then comes in the 4th quarter like a movie and helps lead Trinity to the tight 4 point victory over Winny. Are you kidding me? OK, NHhoopguy what in Jordan Lagguerre's name happened at Winny. Did Hayden go in for a quick change at the end of the 3rd and come in at the start of the 4th or during the 4th? So, his ankle wasn't feeling good in the first 3 periods, but miraculously felt better in the 4th quarter? Talking about Madol hitting the net on shots: Was the ball in the cylinder when Madol hit the nets? If so, this would be Basket Interference, not Goaltending. If a player un-intentionally hits the net while trying to block a shot, then this is perfectly legal. If a player un-intentionally or intentionally hits the net while the ball is in the cylinder, then it's basket interference. If Madol was un-intentionally touching the net while trying to block a shot, then it was legal. If the ball was in the cylinder and Madol touched the net either intentionally or un-intentionally then it would be Basket Interference.

NH sports Fan, did Salem collapse with 2 guys on Mathieu most of the time? If I'm a Class L team and I see that Pinkerton beat Salem by 18 points with Mathieu only scoring 4 points, then I would be worried about playing the Astros.

The player was not madol, but a taller player. #5.
when the shot would go up, he would try to block it and always seemed to hit the backboard or net, even the times he would get apiece of the ball.
Yes,Hayden came on the court late in the 4th, ankles taped and wearing brown socks!
He did miss freethrows, but the Ot he settled down the game for trinity to lead them to the win

Also, one time during the game, a winny player took a layup and a trinity player tried to block it, but instead slapped the backboard really hard.
The refs called a technical foul , but did not call goaltending/interferance.

#5 is Sylvere Aluko. He's about 6'7 or 6'8. By your description it sounds like everything he did was legal. If you un-intentionally hit the backboard while attempting to block a shot, then that's legal. If you slap the backboard while the ball is going off the back board or on the rim, then it's a technical.

Aluko is a work in progress. It doesn't surprise me that he was hitting the net while trying to block shots.

Hayden wearing brown socks with the road red of the Pioneer uniform? That must have looked sweet !!

Hayden wearing his UPS Socks comes to the rescue after 5pm. UPS does do late night deliveries. So who in the Hayden family is supplying him with the UPS colors?

ChiKid - I presume the fashion police, with all 3 cameras in Milford, wouldn't approve of brown socks on the court, correct?

The aluko kid did foul out. very raw kid.
Knowles did a good job on madol, even though i thought madol could go one on one at any time.
Winny does not have much in size, but with the athletism of gould, knowles, dunn, cronan, mcrail and busfiels off the bench, the can run and hustle with anybody.

Not sure if this should be called an upset but Bow beat Pembroke and the mighty Spartans from the north have now lost twice this season to MV and Bow. Is it possible that the Northern teams are better than some expect or is it Pembroke has really dropped off?

Nice to know that Knowles' senior season might have a chance to be productive. If he rounds into shape then Winny will be a tough game for any one.

ChiKid - I always thought Pembroke was ranked higher in pre-season polls than they should've been. It doesn't surprise me that they already have 2 losses. I saw them in summer league and I thought they would not be in the top 6 in class I and maybe fight to be in the top 8.

So, to answer your question, Pembroke has dropped off from last season.

No mention of the Trinity - Winny game in the UL, but this was from seacoastonline.com.
Nothing about brown socks or Hayden's Clark Kent/Superman phone booth change.


By TeRrill covey
sports@seacoastonline.com
January 06, 2010 2:00 AMHAMPTON — It took overtime for defending champion Trinity to knock off upset-minded Winnacunnet in a Class L boys basketball match-up Tuesday night.The Warriors' defense scratched and clawed out of various presses, led by Ryan Dunn (seven steals), but it wasn't quite enough, as Trinity (3-0) pulled away in the extra frame to win 57-53.

With Trinity up 42-40, Trinity's Phil Hayden missed the front end of a one-and-one. The Warriors (1-1) took the ball back down the court and Steve Cronan tied it at 42 off a feed from Harry Knowles.Two Trinity turnovers later, Knowles found Cronan again to give the Warriors a 44-42 lead with just under 20 seconds to play. Cronan was fouled on the play, but couldn't finish off the 3-point play.David Madol gathered the rebound of the missed free throw and pushed the ball ahead to Hayden, who missed a lay-up, but got his own rebound and put it back with just four seconds to play to send the game into overtime.

Madol took over in overtime, as he scored four of his team-leading 15 points in the overtime period, and gathered three rebounds and two blocked shots in the extra frame. "We take a lot of confidence out of this," said Winnacunnet coach Jay McKenna. "We went into this with the idea that they are the defending state champs, but our goal is to be a championship team, so we should not be intimidated by them; we should come out and challenge them start to finish, and we did that tonight."

The Warriors' problem was their free throw shooting. They went just 1-for-5 in the pivotal fourth quarter, and shot just 4-for-11 in the game.

Knowles led all scorers with 18 points, and added four steals and five rebounds. Dunn finished with eight points, seven steals, six assists and three rebounds. Jesse Gould had 16 points and five steals for the Warriors.Madol led Trinity with 15 points, 11 rebounds and six assists, while Zach Stevens had 12 points and seven rebounds.