basketball

Press release:

Batavia High School Coach Buddy Brasky will hold Basketball Training Camp at Batavia City Schools this summer.

Brasky will be joined by: skills instructor Tim Sullivan; Tom Redband, girls varsity coach at Elba High School; Matt Shay, boys varsity coach at Pembroke High School; Billy Truitt, former Division 1 and professional basketball player; and Bill Pitcher, longtime area basketball player and coach.

Basketball Training Camp will be held from July 3rd- Aug. 11^th.  There will be two sessions:

1. Monday/Wednesday/Friday from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. for boys in grades 9-college;
2. Tuesday/Thursday/Friday from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. for boys in grades 7 and 8, and girls in grades 7-college.

This is a six-week program that will emphasize offensive skill development. The program is open to anyone, male or female, from grades 7- college.

Cost for the program is $395. For an application call or text Buddy Brasky at 585-356-4050 or email mbrasky@bataviacsd.org

Too many missed shots and too many turnovers made it hard for Notre Dame to keep up with Panama yesterday at Buffalo State College in the Far West Regional championship for Class D girls basketball.

Notre Dame lost 49-40.

Callie McCulley scored 13 points, Margaret Sutherland, eight; Morgan Rhodes and Natalie Thornton had six each.

Elba had plenty of chances to beat C.J. Finney in the Section V Class D consolidation game. They had second and third and fourth chances -- the kind of chances you get by snagging offensive rebounds and putting them back for baskets.

But in the third and fourth quarters, those balls weren't rolling in.

"We stressed crashing the offensive rebounds," said Head Coach Ciaci Zambito. "We felt we would have an advantage on the glass tonight. The first half, we capitalized on some those and in the second half, we didn't. That's just how the game is. The ball didn't roll our way and that's the unfortunate part of the story of the night."

Putting in more of those shots would have helped the Lancers overcome the sharpshooting of Finney's guards, who netted 13 three-point shots helping Finney advance to the Far West Regional Championship with a 52-48 win.

Max Harris hit six three-pointers for Finney and Dylan Occur hit four, all in the first quarter.

All those swishes put Elba in a mood to try a little outside shooting to start the second half and that got them in a little trouble.

"We haven't been a great shooting team all year," Zambito said. "Our thing is we need to attack the basket. Sometimes when other teams do things well you try to match them. They shot the ball well tonight and we tried to match them doing that and we came up short."

Finney's guards can also handle the ball well, so the Lancer's attempt to trap and press wasn't as effective as Zambito would have liked, so Elba dropped back into a half-court offense.

"They're just such good shooters," Zambito said. "There isn't much you could do about that."

Zambito praised his seniors, who came up in a program that a few years ago only got five or six wins, but starting last year, when Zambito became coach, they bought into the new scheme of things and worked hard to come together as a team and help Elba get its first Section V title in boys basketball since 2005.

"To end their career with a sectional championship just goes to show you how hard they've worked," Zambito said. "It's incredible."

For Elba, Tucker Bezon scored 20 points. He hit three threes. Shane O'Hallaran scored 10. Jon Boyce scored nine.

Whether through fatigue, Notre Dame's defense or just that's the way the ball bounces, a dearth of scoring in the fourth quarter last night cost the Elba Lady Lancers a chance to advance to the regional championship round of post-season basketball.

The Lady Irish prevailed in the Class D consolidation game between the two Section V champions. The final, 44-31.

Elba had a first half lead after scoring 15 points in the second quarter, going into the locker rooms up 19-18, were down by only two points, but a four-point fourth quarter for Elba enabled Notre Dame to pull away and secure the win.

Head Coach Tom Redband said his girls struggled with free throws and layups in the second half and fell out of rhythm.

"I don’t think it was adjustments they made," Redband said. "We just missed free throws and some layups that normally we make and that’s basketball. Sometimes they fall, some times they don’t. It just kind of caught up to us."

Tom McCulley, head coach of Notre Dame, said he thought Elba trying to guard a couple of his bigger players, such as Callie McCulley and Margaret Sutherland, took a toll on Elba.

"Eventually our size and strength just wore them down to where we could get the ball to where we wanted to and make our shots down the stretch," McCulley said.

He said he was exceptionally proud of his team.

"All season long I’ve been telling the girls, 'we just have to do what we do,' " McCulley said. "We are going to have nights where we can’t find the basket and nights where we’re a little sluggish but if we stay to who we are, we just don’t press and try to relax, these girls are good enough to where eventually it’s going to happen for them.

"That’s what you’ve seen in the second half of the season. We’ve figured out what works and doesn’t work and these girls are playing phenomenally well together and it’s nice to watch."

For Notre Dame, Sutherland scored 16 points, McCulley, 13, Morgan Rhodes, 9.

For Elba, Maddie Muehlig scored seven, as did Nicole Boldt. Tatum Draper scored six and Madison Howard scored five.

Notre Dame plays for the Far West Regional Championship in Class D at 3 p.m., Saturday, at Buffalo State.

Top three photos by Destin Danser. For more photos of the game and a chance to purchase game photos, click here. Bottom photo by Howard Owens.

The Elba Lancers didn't dominate Prattsburg in the Section V Class D1 match at Alfred State yesterday, but there was never a time when it didn't seem like the squad was anything but in control of the game.

That comes from experience, said Ciaci Zambito, in his second year as head coach of Elba.

The Lancers started four seniors.

"They’ve played in a lot of big games," Zambito said. "They don’t get rattled by this kind of environment. Obviously, this is the biggest game they’ve ever played in up to this point, but it’s hard work. If you work hard and prepare yourself for moments like this, when you get to it it’s going to be a little bit easier."

Four seniors and a freshman, Collin O'Halloran, a point guard who scored 16 points, grabbed seven rebounds and had four assists and four steals to make him the most valuable player of the tournament.

The low score on both sides -- Elba won 50-38 -- really shows the game was really a defensive battle, Zambito said.

"When you hold a team that good to 38 that just speaks volumes to the effort and the defensive attitude that we have as a program," Zambito said.

The other top scorer for Elba was Tucker Bezon, who had 12 points to go with 13 rebounds. Shane O'Halloran had seven points and six rebounds, and Jon Boyce had seven points and seven rebounds. 

This is the fourth sectional title for Elba and the first since 2005, when Zambito was a junior on the team. That year both the boys and the the girls won Section V titles, a feat repeated this year.

Zambito said he wanted to acknowledge last year's seniors because they really helped make this year's championship possible, he said, by embracing a young coach and setting the example of hard work and leadership for the younger players.

"They kind of created the blueprint to our program and these guys just took it and put up the building, if that’s the way you want to look at it," Zambito said.

Next up for Elba, a Class D consolidation game to be played Wednesday. The time and location is not yet available.

Man, the last 12 minutes of basketball played in Letchworth last night were tense.

With about four minutes left in regulation, the Lady Irish of Notre Dame looked like they had the game well in hand. A double-digit lead and good command of the game over the previous three-and-a-half quarters. Then the wheels sort of came off.

Turnovers, mental errors, penalties -- York managed to tie the game by the end of the fourth quarter.

That meant overtime. 

And at the end of overtime, the two teams fighting for the Class D1 Section V championship were tied again.

"I'm proud of the heart that they showed, not just tonight, but along this whole run," said Head Coach Tom McCulley said. "I’m amazed at the effort they put out."

Finally, at the end of the second OT, there was a final score. Notre Dame beat York 64-59.

McCulley is in his first season as head coach of the Lady Irish, replacing Dave Pero, who led Notre Dame to Section V titles and a state championship. McCulley said getting this far in his first season has been "surreal," but gave all the credit to the girls.

"These girls have been motivated and worked hard in practice and we had a tough schedule that really challenged us," McCulley said. "These girls have been battle tested since the middle of December. That’s why they were able to keep their cool and pull out the victory."

During regulation play, you could sort of watch things unravel slowly. Not only did Notre Dame lose the lead, in the second overtime, Notre Dame found themselves down by a point with less than two minutes to play.

"That can demoralize some teams," McCulley said. "Our team, we’re not built that way. They showed character and they fought through.

"We were gassed," McCulley added. "Both teams were gassed. It was a full-court, man-to-man the whole way. It was like a prize fight. At some point, somebody’s going to give. They got into foul trouble. A couple of girls fouled out. I knew it was wearing them down, so I knew once we wore them down we could get the ball to the spots so we could score relatively easily."

The win sets up what promises to be a classic confrontation -- Notre Dame, the Class D1 champs, vs. Elba, who won the Class D2 championship earlier in the evening at Letchworth. These are two powerhouse girls basketball programs with a long history of winning (both have won state championships this decade) and a long history of wanting to beat each other more than any other team -- other than the one right in front of them. Notre Dame and Elba will play at 7 p.m., Tuesday, at Cal-Mum to consolidate the Class D championship so one of the teams can go on to represent Section V in the Far West Regionals, the next step toward a possible berth in the state championship Final Four.

The last time the two teams met in post-season was 2013 when Notre Dame upset Elba in a semifinals game on its way to an eventual state championship. Elba hadn't won a Section V title since 2012 when they went on to become state champs.

Callie McCulley, tournament MVP, scored 20 points. Margaret Sutherland scored 16, Natalie Thornton 13, Hannah Bowen got nine and Morgan Rhodes, six.

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There's nothing like getting your star player back from injury right before the championship game to give your team a boost of confidence and that's exactly what happened for the Elba Lady Lancers, who captured the Class D2 Section V championship Friday night with a 49-39 win over Romulus.

Emily Reynolds, who missed the previous six games with a knee injury, was named the tournament MVP after the win.

"Having the best player in the class back helped a lot," said Head Coach Tom Redband. "Just the morale boost alone, but she's also definitely a dominate force inside."

Reynolds scored 19 points and pulled down five rebounds.

"She worked really hard to strengthen her knee and she loves the game," Redband said. "I was just so happy for her that she was able to come back and play full strength."

Romulus opened the game with a full-court press and while Elba was successful at breaking the press, it did slow the Lancers down and helped keep Romulus within a basket or two of the lead through the first half. When Romulus dropped the press, Elba fell into an offensive rhythm and was able to pull away.

"It helped us a little bit get into our half-court offense and relax a little bit," Redband said. 

Tatiana Draper scored eight points for Elba and handled 12 rebounds. Maddie Muehlig scored seven points and had three assists.

Redband replaced the legendary Tom Nowak, who coached teams to 10 sectional titles, for the 2014 season. Redband is now one for one in Section V title games.

The Lady Lancers will next face archrival Notre Dame in a Class D consolidation game at Cal-Mum on Tuesday. Game time is 7 p.m. The last time the two teams met in post-season was 2013 when Notre Dame upset Elba in a semifinals game on its way to an eventual state championship. Elba hadn't won a Section V title since 2012 when they went on to become state champs.

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Alexander's shots just weren't dropping during the first half of their Section V semi-final playoff game against Cal-Mum on Wednesday night at Avon.

The Lady Trojans lost 60-36 after scoring only six points in the first two quarters.

Marissa Scharlau scored 15 points and snagged 16 rebounds. Olivia George scored 11 points.

The Batavia Blue Devils played hard but came up short, letting a five-point lead slip away in the closing minutes of play against Wilson in a Section V semi-final to lose 57-55.

"My guys fought," said Head Coach Buddy Brasky. "They fought. We could have folded and they fought."

They fought on even after star guard Tee Sean Ayala fouled out with more than a minute left in the third quarter, putting him and his game-high 24 points on the bench the rest of the way.

That isn't the reason Batavia lost, though. Jonathon Liciaga in particular stepped up to fill the void, finding ways, even at 5' 9", to slip in behind Wilson's big center, 6' 7" Patrick Phillips, for easy baskets. He scored six points in the final quarter.

"I give a lot of credit to our guys," Brasky said. "After Tee Sean went out, they could have folded. They didn’t. Some other guys stepped up, but it just wasn’t enough."

Liciaga, who scored 11 points total, has become a bigger factor in Batavia's offense as the season has worn on as his talent for finding open space on the court has become more apparent.

"Guys figured out as the year went on, he’s open and he can put the ball in the basket," Brasky said. "As the year went on they started finding him more and more."

In the final minute, the Blue Devils didn't score and Brasky said that was the result of some bad decisions.

"The initial pressure (from Wilson) didn’t hurt us," Brasky said. "On the back end, we had some turnovers down the stretch. We made some bad decisions. We missed some open guys. That’s what young teams do, I guess."

Brasky and every player on the team certainly wanted to end the season with a Section V trophy. That, after all, is kind of a Blue Devil's tradition under Brasky, but as Brasky noted, this is a young team (only three seniors). The team has come a long way over the course of the season from a rather disorganized, mistake-prone group to being more disciplined on offense and defense.

"We preach at beginning of the year, especially this year, that it’s going to be a journey," Brasky said. "We had to keep trying to improve and we wanted to try and peak at the end.

"We went through some tough stretches and at the end of the year, we started playing some pretty good basketball. I thought we played, for the most part, tonight, we had stretches of really good basketball from a lot of guys, but again, it wasn’t enough."

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If the Perry Yellowjackets win a sectional title this Friday, it won't be because Oakfield-Alabama didn't work hard to try and spoil their so-far-undefeated season.

The Hornets were in the game until halfway through the final quarter when foul trouble took two starters off the court and Perry was able to finally pull away for a 78-63 win.

The Yellowjackets are a bigger team with Tyler Cowie, at 6' 3", 180 pounds, and Dan Elliott, 6' 4", 190 pounds, in the post, and a nearly unstoppable shot creator in Austin Croll at guard. But O-A got into their heads early, disrupting their offense with tight, aggressive coverage that led to several turnovers on steals, penalties and mental errors.

"What I noticed is a lot of teams kind of backed off them, hesitant or concerned about getting blown out, but we can’t back off," said Hornets Head Coach Ryan Stehlar. "We have to use our speed, our defense, and our intensity, so I wasn’t going to change our game plan. If we were going to go out, we were going to go out our way."

The Hornets had a lead of 16-13 at the end of the first quarter and 32-31 at the end of the half. Perry jumped out early in the third quarter, led most of the way and were head by about by five points early in the fourth quarter when O-A rallied a bit to get a single-digit lead with about five minutes left. That would be the Hornet's last lead of the night. 

"I've seen them several times this season and those guys play hard," said Perry Head Coach Phil Wyant. "We knew it was going to be tough. They scrap, they battle, they play a lot of guys who can put it on the floor and are willing to shoot and that presented a tough match-up, especially when they’re making tough shots."

Reice Woodward and Dalton Carlsen fouled out and either because that took some defensive pressure off the Yellowjackets, or O-A fatigue or just the great talent on the Perry team, the Yellowjackets quickly pulled away and never let the Hornets get back in the game the rest of the way.

Cowie finished with 32 points, 14 rebounds, and nine blocked shots. Croll scored 24 points.

"Austin and Tyler, not only are they great players, but they do whatever it takes to find the open guy, make a play for a teammate, and get it done on the defensive end," Wyant said. "They were down there guarding two of their better players. Yeah, Austin and Tyler, I'm glad they're on our team, that's for sure."

Also for Perry, Spencer Owen scored 12 points and had 10 rebounds.

For O-A, Tylor Ohlson scored 18 points, including hitting three three-pointers. Woodward scored 15 and Carlsen scored 15.

Perry faces Cuba-Rushford on Friday for the Section V Class C title. 

"We know it's going to be a tough challenge," Wyant said.

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Elba advanced in sectional play Saturday night, beating Genesee Valley at home, 60-45.

Tucker Bezon scored 19 points. Henry Pflaumer got 15 and Shane O'Halloran, 9. 

Noah Windus had 14 for GV and Logan Glover, 13.

The Blue Devils are moving on in the post-season with a Section V playoff win today over Honeoye Falls, 59-49.

Antwan Odom scored 22 points, hitting two threes along the way. Tee Sean Ayala scored 14 points, hitting two three-pointers. Jonathan Liciaga scored 11. John Kindig added six.

For HF-L, Owen VanNewkirk hit 15 points, including a trio of threes.

It was the 400th win for Head Coach Buddy Brasky (submitted photo below).

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It was all action on the home court of the Hornets last night as Oakfield-Alabama and the Pavilion Golden Gophers staged a shootout in a quest to advance in the Section V tournament. 

O-A came out on top, 75-70.

For Oakfield-Alabama, Tylor Ohlson scored 17, Ryan Douglas, 16, Reice Woodward, 15, Dalton Carlsen, 13, Joey Burdick, 11.

For Pavilion, Luke Milligan scored 20, Hunter Seaman, 15 (hitting four three-pointers), Ryley Elliott, 12 (two three-pointers), Caleb Milligan, 11 and Rob Cutcliffe, eight.

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Le Roy easily dispatched North Rose-Wolcott in its quest for possible Section V title with a 79-32 win on its home court. 

Ryan Boyce scored 13 points, hitting two of two three-point tries. Canyon Roster added 12, Josh Laurie, 11, and T.Y. Williams and Jason Doemling each had nine. Boyce and Roster also each had seven rebounds.

Rose-Wolcott's Tyler Norris, who had been averaging more than 30 points a game recently was held to 15 points. He was 0-6 from beyond the arch.

Photos by David Boyce.

For the first time in school history, the Pembroke Dragons varsity boys entered the first round of sections as the #1 seed.

The #8 ranked Geneseo Blue Devils entered the game with an upset in mind, and made a strong showing on defense by holding the high-scoring pembroke offense to just 40 points. Pembroke's top scorer, Zach Vonkramer, was held to just 10 points on the game, while Geneseo's Kyle Rollins put up 17 points for the Blue Devils. 

Photos by Destin Danser Photography. Click Here to view complete gallery or purchase prints. 

Margaret Sutherland posted a double-double (13 points and 10 rebounds) to help lead Notre Dame's Lady Irish to a 55-23 victory over Lyndonville in their opening Section V playoff game Wednesday night.

Callie McCulley scored 15 points. Morgan Rhodes added nine points to go with seven steals. Hannah Bowen and Emma Finch each scored six and Bowen also had six steals.

The Pembroke Lady Dragons varsity basketball team traveled to Geneseo Wednesday night to compete for a chance to advance in the 2017 Sectional Championships.

It was clear from the start that Pembroke didn't have an answer for the strong offense and accurate shooting of Geneseo. The statistics make this abundantly clear; Pembroke's top scorer was MacKenzie Jurek with just eight points while Geneseo's Kaity Keihl scored 17 points.

In the end the Lady Dragons fell 62-26 and were eliminted, ending their season.

Photos by Destin Danser Photography. Click here to view complete gallery and purchase prints. 

Le Roy opened its bid for a 2017 Section V title with a convincing win over Holley, 59-35.

Canyon Roster scored 14 points for Le Roy. Josh Laurie had 13 and Ryan Boyce, 11.

Holly's Dylan Hillabush led all scorers with 17 points. 

The Alexander Trojans were impressive from the start in their first sectional game of the season, taking an early lead in the first quarter and maintaining it for the rest of the game.

Letchworth attempted to claw its way back into the game throughout the second half, however were unable to do so due to several blocked shots by Alexander's Erik Scharlau on defense. Leading scorers for Alexander were Dustin Schmieder (19 points), Matt Geneway (16 points), and Chris McClinic (14 points). 

Photos by Destin Danser Photography. Click here to view the complete gallery and purchase prints. 

Bryn Luckey once again came up with the winning shot, hitting a three-pointer at the close of the game to give Le Roy a 37-34 win over Warsaw.

Luckey finished with eight points, as did Libby Loftus. Lydia Borrelli and Ceci Tillson each had seven.