The Rhinebeck boys basketball team saw its magical postseason run end when its offense went cold in the second half resulting in a 65-42 loss to S.S. Seward on Saturday afternoon in the Section 9, Class C championship game played at the Kaplan Center on the campus of Mount Saint Mary College.Things didn't start out very well for the Hawks as the Spartans came out and executed their offense to the tune of a quick 9-0 advantage. Nick Lunn then single-handedly got the Hawks right back in the game by scoring six straight points. When Ben Hoynes stepped back and drained a trey, the Hawks had pulled within 11-9.
" We had some unforced turnovers in the beginning because of jitters but we settled in alright," said Reed Fox. " We just kept playing hard. Our motto is to always put out a ton of energy and keep working hard the whole game."
" I think we were nervous right off the bat," concurred Hawks guard Ben Hoynes. " This was the first sectional final for our guys."
Seward held a 16-11 lead after the first eight minutes of action. Every time the Spartans looked like they might distance themselves from the Hawks, Lunn and Hoynes would lead the charge back. A Justin Targia jumper went in and out at the buzzer to leave Rhinebeck trailing by a score of 29-26 at halftime but, more importantly, Lunn was injured when he took a nasty fall while going for a rebound and would never return for the Hawks.
" It was demoralizing when we saw him go down so hard," said Fox of the fall midway through the second quarter. " He didn't look so good right away so we knew he wasn't going to be able to play."
" It was definitely a crusher," said Hoynes of the injury to Lunn. " It was scary at first to see him go down so hard. He's a big part of our team and has been all season so just not having him out there, not having his senior leadership really hurt us."
After falling behind 32-26, Hoynes swished a pair of jumpers from the right wing, one from behind the stripe, to pull the Hawks within 32-31 as the fans roared. That was as close as they would get as things began to unravel from there.
" Without Nick we lost some of our depth and I think our legs were a little tired because we had to keep using energy to make runs to come back," said Fox of the game slipping away. " I think it just took a lot out of us."
The Spartans immediately went on a 9-0 run and outscored the Hawks 32-11 from that point in the game to make the game seem more one sided than it was.
" Against a team with more guards the match-up was better for us with Nick in there," said Rhinebeck coach Dave Aierstok. " I don't know if we would have won or lost or not because a lot of our shots were not falling and theirs were. They were causing us a lot of problems as far as running our offense and we had a lot of unforced errors."
The gritty Hawks squad kept fighting until the end but the Spartans just had too many weapons and too much depth for Rhinebeck to contend with minus Lunn. S.S. Seward coach Rob Gravelle was happy with the win and knew that Rhinebeck's seventh seed was deceiving to the unknowing.
" This is what we expected," said the Spartans coach. " I told our newspaper that I thought Rhinebeck was the most dangerous team in the draw. They have good size, they shoot the ball well, they have a big kid inside with some length and they share the ball well. We played them in soccer so you know they are great athletes. We fully knew that we had our hands full today."
Hoynes finished the game with 18 points and five rebounds and seemed to be all over the court. Lunn finished with nine points in less than a half with Justin Targia adding five for the Hawks. Jacob Sopchak bucketed four points while snaring eight rebounds and blocking six shots.
David Oliver led the Spartans with 21 points with teammate Scott Glowaczewski adding 16 markers. Taylor Steele found the range for 15 points for the winners, the 14th-ranked team in Class C in New York State.
" The key to the game was getting David Oliver through the first half with only one foul," said Gravelle. " Once we did that, we were able to put him exclusively on Hoynes in the second half and he's a heck of a defender. After that we began to unleash things a little more. I think our pressure got to them a little. They also got some good looks that didn't go in and one of their really good players got injured, unfortunately, and that all plays in to it."
The usually upbeat Hawks were understandably downtrodden after the game. " We expected us to get here," said Fox. " No one else expected us to be here. Coach said he's proud of us and we're proud of each other."
" We gave it all we had so its frustrating," said Hoynes. " We'll come back next year and hopefully get back to this point again."
" We talked about becoming a team and that's what this group did," said Aierstok. " A month ago we lost four in a row and had a little rough spot. For the guys to come together and sacrifice the individual stuff and know that that there is something greater than that is the only reason we're here."
A team party and mohawk haircuts helped solidify this group even more with their coach also buying in by getting the same mohawk hairstyle albeit a bit more conservative than the ones sported by the players.
" We talked about becoming a team," said Aierstok. " That's the only reason we are here. If things didn't change a month ago, we wouldn't be here and that's a learning experience to take with them all through life."
