VESTAL – Best in the Southern Tier Athletic Conference.
Has a nice ring to it, right Norwich?
The Purple Tornado climbed another rung up the ladder extending its unbeaten record to 18-0 beating Union-Endicott, 85-67, in the STAC finals Friday at Binghamton University’s Events Center.
Norwich extended its lead to as many as 25 points in the fourth quarter as the Tigers were relegated to quick shots on offense, and prolific fouling on defense to stop the clock. Michael Sutton finished with 23 points to head a fivesome of NHS players in double figures scoring, and Sutty was 7 of 9 from the free throw line over the final eight minutes. As a team, Norwich made 16 of 21 foul shots over the last minutes.
Norwich coach Tom Collier thought the Tigers went into extend-the-game mode a little earlier than he would have expected, and NHS cashed in on the charity. “I think they were frustrated in the fourth quarter, and it was just a great defensive effort on our part,” Collier said. “U-E is one of the best offensive teams we’ve seen all season, and has a lot of offensive talent. We had to rely much more on individual defensive performances than we had in our other games, and we had great individual performances.”
Eighteen games into the season, only two teams have finished within 15 points of Norwich on the final scoreboard, and none in Section IV since the Tornado’s opening-game win at Oneonta in early December. The comparisons are only natural to the last Norwich teams to win league championships while cutting a unbeaten swathe into sectional play.
That was two decades ago, and Sutton, who added nine helpers in the win, isn’t looking too far ahead. “We just have to keep this going,” Sutton said. “We have more championships to win.”
Union-Endicott trailed by seven at the halftime break, but quickly erased that disadvantage in just over two minutes. The Tigers turned Norwich over three times in that third-quarter salvo beginning with C.J. Krowiak’s pull-up three, a driving layup by Krowiak, and Joey Orlando’s steal and layup that made it 35-35. Following the last of Norwich’s turnovers, Nate Hemphill was fouled on an offensive rebound, and he drained two free throws giving the Tigers the upper hand for the first time since the opening two minutes of the game.
Enter Zan Stewart.
Stewart took a dish from Sutton for a spot-up three as Norwich snatched its lead back. Hemphill drove for a layup giving his club its last lead, 39-38, but Stewart had the bucket in his crosshairs once more pulling up for a trifecta that clearly had wore some Drano as lubricant as it cleared the rim.
Lickety-split, Krowiak pushed the ball up the floor for a quick answer, the first of four straight possessions in which each club held the mantle of one-upmanship.
Storm Cook put back a Michael Oralls miss for the NHS lead, then Hemphill scored inside following Krowiak’s nifty bounce pass on a pick-and-roll from right corner of the foul line. NHS sophomore Carlos Ithier made Norwich’s third consecutive trey, again off a heads-up feed from Sutton before U-E had its final answer, a three ball in the left corner authored by Matt Eastman that tied the game at 46.
The rest of the quarter – and the majority of the fourth stanza – was all Norwich.
Sutton scored on a hard drive downing a lefty layup, Oralls hit a spot-up three from the top of the key, and Oralls dropped in another deuce with a nifty spinning move in the lane.
Despite briefly giving up its halftime lead, Norwich exited the third quarter with an eight-point advantage.
“That’s typical Norwich basketball,” said Union-Endicott coach Joe Alger on Norwich’s ability to swing the momentum back its way. “They hustle to every loose ball...all the credit to Norwich tonight.”
