The excitement and anticipation of the first game of the season is something every team experiences.  It's similar to the enthusiasm a team feels prior to playing in front of a big crowd – or facing the school's rival.  For Williamsville South, the 2016 campaign began last night with all three factors playing a heavy influence.  The result was an incredible display of emotion that led to an unbelievable start, behind a mountain of momentum.  But expending emotion always leads to fatigue.  Luckily for the Billies, they had just enough left in the tank.

 

Before an outstanding December crowd that included large, boisterous student sections from both schools, Williamsville South hosted Williamsville North in a nonleague rivalry tilt of top ten WNY large schools.  The Billies started strong, built a huge halftime lead, and then hung on down the stretch, defeating the Spartans, 58-51.

 

South saw three seniors reach double figures in scoring in the game, and all three were a big part of the reason the Billies raced out to such a fast start.  Graham Dolan drilled a 3-pointer to ignite the crowd on South's first possession.  Myles Hall added a pair of baskets, before Dolan scored again and South was out to a 9-0 start before the midway point of the opening stanza.  Dolan would strike again from downtown, along with Jordan Buell, as the South surge to start got them a 17-9 lead heading into the second quarter.

 

"We always start the latest, I think along with Canisius, and it gets hard to practice against each other", South coach Gabe Michael said following the game, referring to his team's spirited start.

 

North looked like it had settled in during the second quarter, keeping pace with the Billies and still trailing by eight points with under three minutes left before halftime.  But the Spartans were unable to find the basket again in the half, while the Billies started splashing again.  Hall swished his second trey of the quarter with 2:31 left, followed by back-to-back long range busts from Buell that put a punctuation mark on a 13-2 run that ended the half and sent South jogging to the locker rooms with a 33-16 advantage.

 

"I thought we had two awful practices leading into today, and I truly believe you play how you practice", North coach Chuck Swierski said.

 

Late in the third quarter and still trailing by 17 points, 45-28, the Spartans finally made up some ground.  Sean Hill's 3-pointer from straight away was followed by a pair of scores from Maceo Jack, as North pulled within 10 points with eight minutes remaining.

 

Behind the inspired play of Hill and some timely scoring from Nick Maranto (six points in the fourth quarter), North continued to scratch and claw into the final stanza, until a 21-3 run had brought them all the way back, and the Spartans owned their first lead of the game, 49-48, with two minutes to play.

 

"Sean Hill was really great, I mean he was outstanding", Michael said.  "I knew North had a run in them, but I thought we would handle it a little better – they just kept coming and coming".

 

With 58 seconds left, Buell rebounded a miss and scored on the put back to put his Billies back in front, 50-49.  Defense, rebounding, and free throw shooting the rest of the way would seal it for South, who had just enough left to finish what they had started.

 

"We were soft offensively in the second half", Michael said.  "We are out-manned a little inside and wore out some in the second half".

 

The Billies were without starting forward Matt Foster, who gives the team a strong presence inside, and were pleasantly surprised with the contributions of Buell, who had been limited with an injury.

 

"We've been through adversity already, so I think we're a little more hardened than we normally are and we've got a lot of kids that have been around the program for a lot of years and are really happy to be here".

 

Hall led the Billies with 19 points, Buell scored 16 points, Graham Dolan finished with 10 points, while Greg Dolan added nine points.

 

Hill netted a game-high 22 points for the Spartans, while Jack scored 13 points.

 

-centercourt