Boys Dem Coach Keith Swanston said Saturday’s match with the Lakers was a statement game, and when it was over his team had done all the talking.
Swanton’s charges shellacked the struggling Lakers, 100-59, at the Ronald Charles Gymnasium on Saturday, making a huge statement to the rest of the league.
Boys Dem is easily the youngest team in the league, but fans who have followed the St. Croix summer league over the last couple of years have seen these youngsters mature into players who will challenge for this year’s championship trophy.
The team has depth at just about every position, especially the point, where they have three or four guards who could start for any team in the league. This team can flat out shoot, as was witnessed Saturday by the Lakers. The Lakers’ zone defense was shredded by 14 three-pointers, and they just did not have the bodies to stay with Boys Dem in any other defensive scheme.
By halftime the Lakers, who also had two starters out, were down by 22 points at 48-26 and things did not get any better after intermission. Boys Dem was even better defensively in the second half, and outscored the Lakers 52-33 for a final score of 100-59.
Every player on the Boys Dem bench got into the scoring column, led by S. Gardner’s 20 points. Zee Swanston had 17 and Wilson Ferrance added 12. Point guard Glen Coggins dished out a game high 10 assist for Boys Dem. The Lakers got 16 points from S. Scatliffe and 12 from T. Thomas.
In the early game the Hoyas’ Karl John scored 15 points and grabbed 11 boards to lead his team to an 87-74 victory over Alliance. John got good offensive support from Darnel Hendrickson, Eddie Castillo, and Rubio Heywood, who finished with 16, 13, and 12 points respectively. Defensively his brother Kurt “Tennis Man” John was a monster under the boards; grabbing 12 rebounds while swatting away seven shots. Alliance was led by their most consistent scorer over the last few games, Warren Christian, with a game high 22 points and Jerome Nathaniel who finished with 16, eight assist and eight rebounds.
