The stage was set and the expectations were quite high for the rematch of last year’s 6B championship game between Noam and SAR. Noam came out strong early and raced to a 6-0 lead until David Gellis picked up two early fouls. The SAR Sting attacked back with Gellis out and tied it up. The Knights recovered with strong baskets by Eli Gilad and Aiden Sausen to take a 10-6 lead at the end of the first quarter.

Then the Knights picked up the pace with nice baskets from Eli Gilad and Aiden Sausen to take a 10-6 lead. SAR began to give the ball exclusively to Henry Mann or Eli Neuwirth who attacked the basket and got rebounds.

The game was low scoring with many missed shots on both sides and was tied heading into the half at 18 all.

After the half, Noam came out determined to pull away from the Sting and went up quickly by six by driving hard to the basket and knocking down their jumpers, especially by Ezra Baron. SAR would not give up and fought its way back into the game and tied it up.

The fourth quarter began with Noam leading by two; SAR would not go away and took their first lead of the game with four minutes left to play in regulation. Noam responded immediately to tie it up and the next 2-3 minutes the game went back and forth with few baskets being scored and a lot of good defense. Finally, the Knights pulled up by four points with two minutes left with a clutch shot by Ezra Baron.

Henry Mann of SAR quickly led his team back to tie it up but with the score tied, both teams lost the ball on mistakes. Finally, on a missed shot with 14 seconds left, Aiden Sausen got the offensive rebound and was fouled with the score tied. He missed the first free throw but made the second, which put Noam up by one for good. Henry Mann’s last-second effort fell just short and the Noam Knights hung on to win 34-33 and avenged last year’s loss with a victory.

By Noam Kinderlehrer