By Anthony Bosco
Cardozo may have been the No. 1 seed heading into Saturday’s PSAL Class A semifinals, but it was by no means the top draw.
That honor went to the Lincoln Railsplitters and superstar senior Sebastian Telfair, who was still holding court as the Judges and head coach Ron Naclerio took the floor for warm-ups prior to their hard-fought 52-45 win over the Sheepshead Bay Sharks at St. John’s University.
The win entitled the Judges for a date Wednesday night with Telfair and his teammates, who defeated rival Grady, 73-68, at Madison Square Garden. It marks the second time in the past five years the Bayside school has made the sojourn to Manhattan for the championship game.
“If I started thinking about Lincoln right now, I can’t enjoy this victory,” Naclerio said moments after locking up the final’s bid. “I know what we have to go through and doing that with Sebastian is tough. He’s a special player. On the high school level, he’s got that will to win.”
Just getting there was tough enough.
Playing without starting shooting guard Nick Flagg, who was ejected during the team’s quarterfinal win over Banneker and forced to sit for the semifinal following an altercation with an opposing player, Cardozo (28-4) turned to center Theo Davis (12 points) in the second quarter. Davis provided enough breathing room for the Judges, who would never trail again.
The 6-foot-10 junior, who had been held scoreless through the first quarter and early part of the second, finally got on the board with 5:05 remaining in the first half, breaking a 13-13 tie.
Davis also scored the next six points of the game, but a basket by the Sharks’ Oleg Gubanov in the final minute pulled Sheepshead with six, 21-15 at the break.
“He’s a great kid,” Naclerio said of Davis, a transplanted Canadian. “This is good for him. I think he has a lot of potential and I think he’s going to reach it. Being in New York now will help him reach it because he doesn’t realize the intensity, the desire and the hustle of just an average game. It’s like World War III.”
A couple of times in the third quarter Cardozo threatened to make a rout of it, but the Sharks refused to go quietly.
With the Judges already up by six, Dwayne Johnson, who led all scorers with a game-high 18 points, buried a three-pointer at 4:37. After recording a block on the defensive end, forward Skyler Khaleel scored at 4:18 to put the Judges up by 11, forcing Sheepshead coach Roy Steinback to call a timeout.
The brief respite stemmed the bleeding but could not close the wound completely, as Cardozo continued to hold the advantage. A three by Sean Watson in the final second of the third quarter got the Brooklyn school within four, 36-32.
“I thought we were the better team,” Naclerio said. “They never quit. Every time we thought we could go 11 to 13 or eight up, they put a little dagger, you know. (Steven) Jackson got hot. They didn’t go away. We had to put them away.”
But much as Davis did in the second, Johnson regained control for Cardozo, scoring the first four points of the fourth and extending the Judges’ lead back to eight, 40-32.
Another Watson three at the 3:35 mark again got the Sharks within four and a three by Ali Mansour with just 40 seconds remaining made it a one possession game, 48-45. But Johnson hit three-of-four from the charity stripe in the final minute to close out the win for Cardozo.
Vic Morris added 14 points for Cardozo, while Jackson led Sheepshead with 14 and Johnson added 11.
“Some things you can’t prepare kids for,” Naclerio said. “This is a once-in-a-lifetime thrill.”
“I haven’t played in anything like this,” Davis added. “We have playoffs in Canada but nothing this intense. We worked so hard all year to do what we said we were going to do.”
Reach Sports Editor Anthony Bosco by e-mail at TimesLedger@aol.com or call 718-229-0300, Ext. 130.
