Bridgehampton Outlasts Smithtown Christian for Its Second Consecutive Suffolk County Class D Championship

“Ambitious to win.”

Those were the words spoken by Bridgehampton freshman Alex Davis after his Bridgehampton boys basketball team defeated Smithtown Christian, 78-64, at the Danzi Athletic Center at St. Joseph’s University in Patchogue to win its second straight Suffolk County Class D Championship on February 15.

It was Davis’s three-pointer with two seconds remaining in regulation that knotted the game up at 61-61 and forced overtime. Then, in the extra four minute frame, after Smithtown Christian junior captain Nehemiah Yuen drained a three to start, the Killer Bees scored 17 straight points en route to what wound up being a double-digit lead.

Bridgehampton played crosstown rival Pierson in the C/D Qualifier at Southampton High School on Tuesday, results of which were too late to be included in this week’s issue. The winner of that game advances to the B/C/D Qualifier against Southampton this Saturday, February 25, at East Hampton High School at noon.

Win or lose those games, the Killer Bees still have their Regional Semifinal to be played against Section IX Champion (Orange, Sullivan, Ulster counties), which is still to be determined. That game will be played at S.S. Seward Institute in Florida, New York, on March 7 at 7 p.m.

“It feels so good,” the soft spoken but confident Davis, who scored a game-high 27 points that included six threes, said after the game. “We’re just ambitious to win. Just kept pushing.”

“It was a tough game,” Bridgehampton head coach Ron White said. “Kudos to Smithtown. That coach had them prepared. They took it to us. They made some adjustments after the last three times that we played, got us a little stagnant, so we have to go back home, work on a couple of things to make sure that doesn’t happen again. But hats off to coach Dan [Skaritka] and that whole team because they let it all out. Both teams kind of left it all out on the court.”

Coming into the game having beaten them three times during the regular season — which is a rarity in and of itself being that teams typically play each other twice during the regular season — the Bees knew the Knights were going to come after them, and they certainly did. Sophomore captain Lorenzo Crilly willed the Knights throughout the game, keeping them within striking distance throughout. Neither team separated themselves by more than five points the entire game and it was underdog Smithtown Christian that led, 31-27, at the half.

Crilly scored nine of his team-high 24 points in the fourth quarter, and it was his lefthanded layup, plus his ensuing free throw after he was fouled that tied the game at 56-56 late in the fourth quarter. Then, with just 32 seconds remaining in regulation, Yuen, who finished with 17 points, hit a jumper that gave the Knights the lead, and then Crilly sunk one of two free throws after to make it a three-point game, 61-58, putting the Bees and their raucous crowd on their heels and on upset alert.

But with 13.3 seconds remaining, White called a timeout with possession of the ball. Bridgehampton freshman Sae’vion Ward brought the ball downcourt out of the break, and somewhat surprisingly was not fouled by Smithtown Christian. Ward got a clear three-point shot off to try to tie the game, but it popped off the rim and out to about the free throw line where junior Mikhail Feaster grabbed the timely offensive rebound and had the presence of mind to send the ball back out for a three. Basically in one motion, Feaster found Davis practically in the same spot that Ward took his shot, but Davis nailed the three to tie the game.

“When we played Port Jeff, the first time we played them at our house, [Ward] hit that shot, so I was like, I’m going to live or die with that shot, but he missed it,” Davis explained. “Our big man, Mikhail Feaster, dished it out to me and I hit the three to send it to overtime.

“I knew it was going in when it left my hands,” he added.

White said there are a number of players on his team now, especially with the addition of Ward, who can hit a late-game shot, and Davis is certainly one of them.

“It was an amazing shot,” he said. “That guy, he is ice cold. He’s not afraid, he loves this game, you can tell.

“We kind of set that scenario up where it was coming off a screen,” White continued. “It was either going to be Sae’vion or stretch it to the corner. Major rebound and a push back out by Mikhail. He understood what we needed and that was a three ball, and he was able to push that back out. Thankful that he didn’t try and put back another shot.”

Of course the whole “ambitious to win” theme comes after this same group of players, save for Ward, went winless for two years, prior to last year’s county title win, which also came against Smithtown Christian. Kris Vinski, a senior who has been at the forefront of this generation of Bridgies, said those two winless seasons now “feel like a lifetime ago.” Vinski, who finished with 11 points total, scored five straight points in overtime that were basically the dagger into the Knights, draining a corner three, followed by an offensive rebound and put back to make it a 10-point game, 74-64, with 40 seconds left.

“It means a lot,” bringing the county title back to Bridgehampton, “especially because the first two years of not winning a game. We knew it was going to be a dog fight going into it. We knew they were going to come ready, and they were. It showed down to the seconds in regulation when Alex hit the shot. We knew the job was possible. We knew they were going to come at us and we were ready.”

Bridgehampton freshman Jai Feaster was second on the team in scoring with 19 points, seven of which came in overtime. He was also five of six from the free throw line in the second quarter.

But it’s clear that Ward’s addition to the team gives the Bees another dynamic scorer, but also someone who can facilitate from the point. Ward, who finished with 16 points, came back to Bridgehampton this year after spending his past three years at Center Moriches, but he’s certainly familiar with his teammates.

“I’ve played with these boys since elementary school. I know what they can do,” he said. “To be able to come back and help them win games like this makes me feel really good.

“Smithtown Christian came out ready,” he added. “We beat them three times during the regular season — playoffs, none of that counts. They were ready to beat us. We didn’t start off so good, but we fed off of Alex after he hit that shot. We fed off that energy, and we came out with the win.”

White said that with his team’s Regional Semifinal weeks away, its focus will be advancing as far as it can in the county tournament and not taking those games for granted.

“We have to … stay locked in and stay hungry,” White said. “We’ve been wanting this for a long time. These guys have been working for a long time. We had Jai and Alex since they were in seventh grade, and they were getting beat up in seventh and eighth grade. Now they’re in ninth grade and they’re battle tested. They understand the light, they’re ready for the light and they’re back together. Alex, Sae’vion and Jai, they’re back together, that’s the Fab Three. They and our team has to continue to work, become more efficient and limit our turnovers.”