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North Andover Scarlet Knights Boys Basketball '13-'14

Danvers ousts North Andover

DANVERS — Identifying an advantage in basketball is easy. All you had to do here yesterday was check out the layup lines. Danvers High had four players 6-foot-3 or taller, including a 6-foot-9 center Peter Merry and a 6-foot-3 “Charles Barkley clone” in Devan Harris. And North Andover High had a bunch of quick and short (under 6-feet) guards. It took time against a scrappy North Andover defense, but eventually Danvers’ height overpowered the Knights to break away with a 56-45 win, advancing to the Division 2 North semis against tonight’s Salem/Belmont winner. Harris was the fire-breathing dragon that the Knights couldn’t slay. He repeatedly muscled his way to the rim, sometimes through a double-team and made North Andover pay for fouling him. He connected on all 11 free throw attempts and finished with 23 points and 18 rebounds. “We knew going in their size was obviously going to be an issue for us,” North Andover coach Paul Tanglis said. “I thought we fought hard. It was one of those things we had to play pretty much perfect D to stay with these guys and I thought we did for about three quarters.” North Andover (13-9) made it difficult for Danvers (19-3) to make entry passes into the post early, and the Knights shot the ball well in the first quarter, opening a 16-13 lead. After surrendering three 3-pointers and 16 points to its guests, Danvers tightened up defensively. North Andover managed only 29 points over the final three quarters. As the Falcons’ defense got stronger, it also started finding ways to pound the ball inside. “We always have a lot of screens going on, so the pick and roll really helped,” Harris said. “Mark (McCarthy) always goes through on a flare screen and he always comes and gets my man. That always helps and always opens me up to get in front of my guy. That’s all I need, a little bit of space.” There were six lead changes in the first half, but the final one occurred when Harris grabbed an offensive rebound on a missed free throw and finished in the paint. The Falcons held a 27-25 lead at that point and never surrendered it, even though they didn’t make it a three-possession game until there were just three minutes left in the game. “We had an advantage, but we knew with their four guards it was going to be hard to get to the point to get that advantage,” Danvers coach John Walsh said. “We knew if the game was played at halfcourt it wouldn’t favor us, but if we could eventually get the ball down around the 3-point line and pound it in, eventually we’d be able to take advantage.” Harris converted a conventional three-point play to give the Falcons a five-point lead (43-38) with 6:22 to play, and he cashed in on a spin move on the right block for the game’s final field goal with 3:45 to play. That hoop pushed the Danvers lead to six (47-41), and the Falcons connected on 9 of 12 free throws down the stretch to close it out. North Andover tried to attack from the perimeter, attempting shots over the Danvers defense, but field goals were hard to come by late in the game. The Knights only managed two field goals in the final 10 minutes of the game. One of the issues was North Andover’s top 3-point shooter, John Enright, was in foul trouble the entire game (he fouled out midway through the fourth quarter). “We’re kind of limited on size and we try to get things going from the outside. We wanted to look to attack (the hoop) but it’s tough with their big guys; they alter shots and take up a lot of space,” Tanglis said. “It would have been nice to get a little something going on the outside and keep them honest on defense, but we weren’t able to put together any kind of offensive run in the second half.” McCarthy and Kieran Beck provided some scoring from the perimeter for Danvers. McCarthy scored 13 points and Beck added 10. Sophomore point guard Wabissa Bede was the only North Andover player to hit double figures with 12 points. North Andover finished its season with a respectable record of 13-9, but it had the feeling almost since the Commonwealth Motors Christmas Classic (it beat Methuen to win the title), followed by the school’s first win ever at Central Catholic, that this season was special. In fact, with 15.2 seconds on the clock the North Andover student section started chanting “We love you, Tang-lis! We love you, Tang-lis!” The North Andover coach pointed toward the students and mouthed the words, “Thanks guys,” giving a thumbs up. “The support was amazing all year,” said Tanglis, who was a captain for long-time coach Mike McVeigh, who retired last March after leading the Knights to the Div. 2 North sectional finals. “We have a special bond with our fans. It was a great year. Our team gave us everything we asked for. And maybe we surprised a few people.”

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Boys Basketball, 03/03/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars

Andover 0, Central Catholic 0, Greater Lawrence 0, Londonderry 0, North Andover 0, Pentucket 0, Salem 0, Windham 0

 ..............    2013-14 Boys Basketball  team records/scoring leaders   ..................................

Andover .... 19-5 D1N finals to CC who they beat in XMas and reg. season; 4th D1N final since modern tourney began '72: 14, 00, 81, 72. Brooks ... 21-6 lost NE Prep B final; last NE title early '80s with Harold Starks

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Boys Basketball, 02/26/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars

Woburn 62, North Andover 61

Brandon Moscat's banked in 3-pointer at buzzer won it for Woburn 62-61. Missed FTs with 3.4 seconds left came back to haunt North Andover.

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Boys Basketball, 02/19/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars

Bebe leads the way

Wabissa Bede scored 16 points and dished out eight assists to lead North Andover to a 60-50 win over Methuen. Tim Galloway-Burke scored a game-high 29 points for the Rangers.

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Boys Basketball, 02/14/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars

Warriors take care of Knights

 
ANDOVER — Come this part of February, any pulse is a good pulse. And while Andover High's conference title hopes may reside on life support, the beat goes on.
 
Last night before the usual lively full house of a 1,000 or so at Dunn Gymnasium, the Warriors fought off a willing group of Scarlet Knights and prevailed, 59-45, to hold on to a at least a shot at half a Merrimack Valley Conference title.
 
Simply put, Andover must beat Lawrence and Central Catholic in its final two league games, then hope for some help from these same Knights to pull off an upset of the Raiders.
 
Just the opportunity put a wide smile on coach Dave Fazio's face? Or was it something else.
 
"I can honestly say by this one, Game 16, that I like my basketball team," said Fazio. "There was no pretending tonight. They've bought in. That was some real defense out there. We went out and defended hard, and that was the difference this time around."
 
About a month ago, the Warriors may have been "pretending" a bit on the defensive end at North Andover and nearly paid the ultimate price before some last-second David Giribaldi heroics.
 
This was a different story, though, as Andover broke to a 10-0 lead before the home crowd, withstood a three-point third quarter and allowed Giribaldi to seal the deal with 12 of his game-high 23 points in the fourth.
 
"Offensively, we're still an absolute mystery," said Fazio. who saw the Warriors grind to a halt in the 3-point third only to flow like the Shawsheen on a spring morning with 26 points in the fourth."
 
"We've got the freshman (E.J. Perry IV) and we've got an absolute killer at the two guard (in Giribaldi), but after that we're still trying to find ourselves. We lose (center Connor Merinder) at times, and that really hurts us."
 
What the Warriors are certainly, with the Division 1 North tourney right around the corner, is dangerous. And the challenge of facing them is something first year North Andover coach Paul Tanglis was looking forward to.
 
"Competing with Andover in an atmosphere like this will only help us," said Tanglis, whose club made its run in the third, slicing the lead from 14 down to 5 ar 33-28 heading to the fourth. "We battled back, but we put ourselves in a hole because we just didn't value every possession."
 
Senior John Pisacreta helped keep the Warriors afloat through quarters two and three, tossing in 15 points. Merinder had just six points but was again a horse on the backboards.
 
John Enright paced the 11-5 Knights with 16 points and Brett Daley fought through some nasty foul trouble to finish with 10. 

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Boys Basketball, 02/07/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars

Fabulous Fourth

Trailing 47-45, North Andover outscored Haverhill 21-5 in the fourth for a 66-52 win. Wabissa Bede had 15 points and 8 assists while Spencer Reeve (8 points in fourth) added 13 points each. Kyle White defense was the defensive star.

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Boys Basketball, 02/04/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars

Balanced Knights

John Enright (16), Brett Daley (15), Kyle White (11) and Spencer Reeve (10) all scored in double figures as North Andover beat Lowell 62-50.

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Boys Basketball, 01/24/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars

Balanced Knights

John Enright (16), Brett Daley (15), Kyle White (11) and Spencer Reeve (10) all scored in double figures as North Andover beat Lowell 62-50.

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Boys Basketball, 01/24/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars

Win at noon

 

North Andover's boys outscored Lowell in every quarter on its way to defeating Lowell, 60-52, in a road game that started at noon. Wadissa Bede had 18 points and five assists and Brett Daley chipped in with 16 points for the Knights (8-3).

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Boys Basketball, 01/20/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars

Rangers pull past Knights

METHUEN — While the Rangers might not have been out to make a statement, a victory like the one they pulled out last night could go a long way toward defining a season.

A couple weeks after dropping an 11-point decision to North Andover in the Christmas tournament, Methuen repaid the Scarlet Knights 57-48 with a solid second-half performance and moved above the .500 mark on the year.

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Boys Basketball, 01/10/14 » 0 Comments & 0.0 Stars
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