Minzesheimer’s Eye: Boys Varsity Basketball

James Minzesheimer, Blogger

In a close game between The Masters Panthers and The Rye Country Day Wildcats, the Panthers fell short 42-41. To sum up the game it consisted of a lot of turnovers and poor field goal percentages by both teams, in short neither team played “good” basketball.

The leader of the Masters offensive, Josh Bunch, lead the team in points and assists with 11 and 6 respectively. He did very well dishing the ball and scoring, but he struggled from the line missing 6 free-throws. To give Bunch the benefit of doubt, he did play the entire game with junior guard Jon Klein out with an ankle injury, so fatigue could have played a part in him missing some of the free throws later in the game.  And he wasn’t the only one who missed free throws.

The field goal percentages for both teams were distinctively poor (Masters 37%) (Rye Country Day 29%). This game was both won and lost at the free-throw line. Rye Country Day Shot 63% going 7-11 from the free-throw line; while not great it is respectable.  Meanwhile Masters shot 47% going 8-17 and, in a close game like this one and in any game in general, it’s very hard to pull off a victory when you miss more than half your free-throws.

Even with the poor performances at the line one player stood out, freshman Ugochukwu Kachukwu otherwise known as Kach. Kach went 4-4 from the line along with putting 8 points with a highly effective 67% field goal percentage and grabbing 8 rebounds. Other bright players for the Masters offense were Edward Sanchez Barrera and Theo Silverman, who both scored 8 points knocking down two three pointers each.

While Masters won a lot of the main battles in this game, such as rebounds attributed to Matt Grossman and Kach and assists attributed to Josh Bunch, field goal percentage was still low. They lost some crucial battles such as turnovers and free throw percentage which led to the one point defeat. While in my opinion, Masters is playing good basketball and scoring a lot of high percentage shots mainly in the paint, it is very hard to win a game when you miss more than half your free-throws.

Signing off,

James Minzesheimer