December 16-17

Had lunch with Jenny on Wednesday morning, in the evening we were at McCaskey for another league crossover game. The Red Tornado hosted Ephrata, in the JV game JPM won easily 74-40. In the varsity contest we led by twelve at the quarter but by halftime the advantage was down to six. In the locker room the coaches reinforced the point of the postgame talk from Monday, in the second half it was just about all McCaskey. JPM led by fifteen at the end of the third quarter and took it home from there, the final was 75-53. Ricky Cruz had a career-high 22 points, Randolph Speller had 16 and Greg Nunez cracked double figures with 10. The win keeps the club spotless in the league at 3-0 and 4-1 overall. The boys are at home on Friday to open divisional play against Cedar Crest and one needs only to review recent history to understand how important that game should be. What follows is not bravado, it is simply the truth: every basketball program we face within our league bases their success against ours. Any time we lose a game to a league opponent that team considers that win a benchmark moment. They could finish the season 1-21 but if that one win was against McCaskey it's a moment that lives forever. This is not a new phenomenon, it has been that way since the league started in 1972. The rest of the league always views McCaskey as the team to beat, even in years when we were not the favorite. The reason is simple: we are the only "city" school district in the county, all the others are suburban/rural-oriented and we are viewed differently for that reason (and that reason alone). At any rate, I am absent on Friday because the Royals are returning home (finally) from a seven-game road trip, a Wednesday night win in Norfolk brought the club's record on the trip to 3-2-2. Thursday was a dark, rainy and depressing day, between my mother's eye appointment in the morning and her knee therapy in the afternoon there was little else happening. I took the books to basketball practice so they will have them in my absence on Friday. Take care, thanks for reading.