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St. John's Eagles Boys Basketball '17-'18

Wed, Dec 27, 2017 04:15 PM @ Neutral Location
Team 1 2 3 4 Final
Andover 11 4 12 15 42
St. John's 13 21 17 12 63

Prep uses 21-2 run to whip Andover

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Wednesday, December, 27 By Michael Muldoon
Staff writer

METHUEN — They don't play often, but the last few times the Andover High and St. John's Prep basketball teams have met, it's been heart-stopping action.

Wednesday at the 43rd annual Commonwealth Motors Christmas Classic there was none of that drama like in the last two meetings: a tight Prep win in the IAABO Board 130 Classic title game in 2014 and Andover's still hotly-debated OT state tourney win in 2013.

It was all St. John's from the jump. The Eagles (2-1), making their tourney debut, thumped Andover 63-42 to advance to the semis on Friday night back here at the Klimas Fieldhouse.

Andover's Kyle Rocker evened the game at 13-13 with 5:30 left in the second quarter but the Prep closed out the half with a brilliant 21-2 run with Matt Relihan (9 of his 12) and 6-8 Tommy O'Neil (6 of his 8) leading the way.

The scary thing for the rest of the teams in the tourney is high-flying Nate Hobbs sat out the first two-plus quarters for what coach John Dullea called "coach's decision."

The Prep's loss came to Needham, the No. 1 ranked team in Eastern Mass.

Andover (1-2) shot just 17 of 54 (.315) from the floor while the Eagles were 26 of 53 (.491).

On paper, the Golden Warriors figured to have quite a challenge because they don't have a single player listed over 6-2 (6 are listed at 6-2) while the Prep has the 6-8 O'Neil, who has a few small Division 1 college offers, 6-6, 215-pound bruiser Patrick Sweetnam and 6-5 swingman Matt Relihan.

Andover, which starts three juniors, a senior and the promising sophomore Rocker, will try to shake this one off when it plays Londonderry (which lost to Lawrence 66-50) in the consolation round Friday at 2:30 p.m.

 St. John's, the tourney's No. 3 seed, takes on No. 2 Lawrence Friday at 6 p.m. in the semifinals.    

Game Statistics:

Commonwealth Classic (Day 1)
Andover (42): Kevin Flowers 1 0-0 3, Kyle Rocker 3 0-0 7, Charlie McCarthy 1 2-2 4, T.J. Jayasinghe 0 0-0 0, Colin Kirkpatrick 1 0-0 2, Stephen Shaw 5 1-1 11, Cedric Gillette 3 0-0 7, Shamus Florio 0 0-0 0, Emmett Kim 3 2-2 8, Michael Slayton 0 0-0 0. Totals 17 5-5 42 

St. John's Prep (63): Jarnel Snow-Guzman 5 1-1 11, Tommy O'Neil 3 1-4 8, Patrick Sweetnam 3 0-0 6, Kairo Ovalles 2 0-0 4, Christian Lamers 1 0-0 2, Nate Hobbs 4 0-1 8, Christian Plourde 0 0-0 0, Will Batchelder 2 2-2 7, Matt Relihan 4 2-2 12, Liam Dunfee 0 0-0 0, Aidan Callahan 2 0-1 5. Totals 26 6-11 63

3-pointers: And — Flowers, Rocker, Shaw; SJP — Relihan 2, O'Neil, Batchelder, Callahan

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