Indian Hills Holiday Tournament First Round Recap

Dixon, Queen of Peace Tops Ramapo

Merry Christmas... two words you hear during the holiday season. For Queen of Peace, their favorite two words are Bilal Dixon. The big fella led all scorers with 25 points en route to the Griffins 73-51 rout of Ramapo in the first round of the Indian Hills Holiday Basketball Festival. Queen of Peace also got clutch guard play from Dwayne Moffatt. He added 15 in the win.

Ramapo was outplayed but kept things close thanks to good shooting from junior Eric Halejian. He finished with a team high 15 points. Peter Garrambone chipped in 10.

Queen of Peace is scheduled to play the St. Joseph's Green Knights, a four-peat champion of the Indian Hills tournament in the semi-finals on Friday.

Leading Scorers
Queen of Peace
Bilal Dixon - 25
Dwayne Moffatt - 15
Al-Don Mohammad - 13
Javae Gilchrist - 12
Zaire Harris - 8

Ramapo
Eric Halejian - 15
Peter Garrambone - 10
Brian Kincade - 7

St. Joe's Regional Passes Passaic Tech

With four minutes to go, Larry Burroughs and the Passaic Tech Bulldogs held a five-point lead over the St.Joseph's Green Knights. But the four-peat Indian Hills Holiday Tournament champions were not about to go down without a fight. With one minute left, senior Marvin Fulford scored, knotting the game at 60. After some clutch free throw shooting, the Green Knights pulled out the victory 65-62. Hakeem Williams led with 21. Fulford had 11.

Passaic Tech's Larry Burroughs led all scorers with 23 and Maynard Freeman had 13, including a buzzer beater at the end of the first half to keep Passaic Tech in the game.

St. Joe's will have to figure out a way to contain Queen of Peace's Bilal Dixon as the two powerhouses will meet in the semi-finals Friday.

Top Scorers
St. Joe's
Hakeem Williams - 21
Kyle Thomas - 11
Marvin Fulford - 11

Passaic Tech
Larry Burroughs - 23
Maynard Freeman - 13
Asmar Edwards - 11


Bergen Catholic Beats Buzzer and Kennedy

The Bergen Catholic Crusaders are one of the top basketball teams in Bergen County, but someone forgot to pass the memo to the Kennedy Knights. Kennedy matched Bergen Catholic shot for shot, until the final 9 seconds of the game. Crusader senior point guard Dan Marconi drove to the hoop, put up a shot, and as the ball rolled off, Colin Lewis was there to clean it up at the buzzer for the win. Bergen Catholic beat kennedy 51-49. Jon Rigg had 15 points to lead the Crusaders and Lewis, while only scoring 6 points, made the biggest shot of the game.

Kennedy was led by Quadir Leary with 11 and senior LaQuan Peterkin had 10.

Bergen Catholic meets Englewood in the semi-finals on Friday.

Top Scorers
Bergen Catholic
Jon Rigg - 15
Mark Rogalski - 12
Nolan Hill - 9
Dan Marconi - 7
Rob Tolentino - 2

Kennedy
Quadir Leary - 11
LaQuan Peterkin - 10


Englewood Needs OT to Beat Indian Hills

The Englewood Maroon Raiders came out firing against Indian Hills, holding a comfortable 17-4 lead early. The Braves battled back behind Justin VanGroww who scored more than 30 points and send the game into overtime. That's when Englewood took over, going on a 7-0 run that led to a 75-69 win. Englewood's big man Dante Drakeford had a tough time defending VanGroww, but made up for it on offense, making bug shots down the stretch.

Englewood and Bergen Catholic meet in the semi-finals.

SportsTime Media Player

SportsTime will now be providing you video content on the web through YouTube. You can watch SportsTime video using the media player below.

Jack Challenges Leonia High School Bowler

This week on SportsTime I challenge Lawrence Jackson Jr. of the Leonia High School bowling team. Check us out below or watch us on channel 10, this Wednesday, Thursday & Friday at 7:30pm.

I Don't Wanna Be A Chicken... I Don't Wanna Be a Duck... So I Shake My Butt!

In addition to working at SportsTime, Carl and I are co-hosting a podcast called "Knickscast".. Some guys in Boston have a similar podcast they do for the Celtics called Celticscast.

I'm already sick and tired of hearing about the Red Sox and the Patriots from Boston fans. Now I have to hear about the Celtics? Enough is enough. Granted, the Knicks are dreadful this year, but let's at least make things interesting. So I've proposed a friendly bet to the Celticscast dudes. If the Knicks come within 13 games of the Celtics in the Eastern Conference standings at the end of the year, one of their hosts has to dress up in a chicken suit (see left) in front of TD Banknorth Garden.

At the same time, if the Knicks fall more than 13 games out of the standings to the Celtics, I will dress up in a chicken suit and stand outside of the World's Most Famous Arena, Madison Square Garden. Now I'm sure you're saying, Jack, you're an idiot! Why would you make the bet? The Knicks are terrible and are probably going to be at least 20-25 games behind Boston. But you know what, you got to keep things interesting so why not. Besides, I'm sick and tired of hearing about the Celtics. Go New York, Go New York go! And then I woke up and realized, it's no longer 1994, and Anthony Mason is retired.

I'll keep you posted on the friendly bet and will post video of the loser (which will be the Celticscast hosts of course).

Yo Bro!!!

Yo Bro!!! It might become the new "wassssuppp" in North Jersey. Ridgefield High school girls basketball coach Steve Kahn has his very own, custom made "Yo Bro" sneakers that he wears to games. He says the sneakers were recommended to him by his co-workers, because they hear him use the word "bro" a lot. They have also become a bit of a good luck charm and superstition for Coach Kahn. He only wears them on game days and on Saturdays.

I am doing a feature on Coach Kahn's "Yo Bro" magical footwear next Tuesday. I'll post the link to the video on my blog as well as on www.njsportstime.com

Yo Bro!!!

Thanksgiving Football - The Turkey and the Trimmings - Ridgefield vs. Bogota

It has taken me forever to post this, but here it is. I had the pleasure of covering football on Thanksgiving Day. Football at its best. Bogota took on Ridgefield and you can watch the highlights and the special post-game Turkey Leg Player of the Game Ceremony below.

Wayne's World: Four Times a Charm for Wayne Hills

40 wins in a row. Four consecutive state championships. Yet this one was a little extra special for the Wayne Hills Patriots. They played their inner-town rival Wayne Valley in front of tens of thousands of high school football fans at Giants Stadium last Friday night. Wayne Hills kicked off the scoring early when Jeremiah Kayal intercepted a Wayne Valley pass and returned it 51 yards for the touchdown. But Wayne Valley hung tough. They drove the ball down the field leading to a Matt Dortch 2-yard touchdown run that evened things up at 7.

But Wayne Hills answered right back. Carlton Marcin took the ensuing kickoff 89 yards for the touchdown and Wayne Hills never looked back as they beat Valley 27-7.

Perfect! Paterson Catholic Wins State Title

"I'm going to have something delicious and nutritious!" That's what six foot two, three hundred and twenty pound Johnathan Thompson said he was going to have for dinner after just winning the state championship. "We just won the championship... what!!!" The Paterson Catholic Cougars were screaming over and over again as they hoisted the Non-Public Group I state championship trophy over the shoulders. The Cougars rolled over Morristown Beard 28-7 at Giants Stadium last Friday. The win capped a perfect season for Paterson Catholic (10-0).

The Cougars clinged to a 14-7 lead at halftime, but then blew the door open in the fourth quarter. Wayne Mack ran in his second touchdown of the night from 23 yards out to put the nail in the coffin. Paterson Catholic pounded the Morristown Beard defense with 270 yards on the ground.

This is Paterson Catholic's second state title in three years.