Cardinal Mooney rallies past East

Photo

Youngstown East's #24 Antonio Woods puts up a shot while Cardinal Mooney's #42 Doug Caputo and #20 Joe DeNiro get in front of him.

By Greg Gulas

sports@vindy.com

YOUNGSTOWN

Cardinal Mooney High coach Chris Kohl feels his team can become a real force if they could just find a way to string together four complete quarters of basketball.

Opponents just wish they could keep the Cardinals’ senior, Danny Reese, off the court.

Reese, held scoreless in the opening period, scored a game-high 27 points to help the Cardinals to a 62-41 home win over the East Panthers on Wednesday.

“We like to run a lot and it is our defense that sets up out fast break offense,” said Reese.

“We like to bang the boards but we’re at our best when we push the ball up the court,” he added.

The Panthers (0-5), who fell to the Cardinals at home, 58-35, on Dec. 7, took an early 6-4 lead and behind Lee Johnson’s four points, were able to open up a 9-6 margin after the first eight minutes of play.

Two 3-pointers by the Panthers’ Oshay Lawrence offset 12 points by Reese in the second stanza, including a bucket from mid-court at the buzzer, as East settled for a 26-23 lead at the intermission.

“We executed really well at both ends of the court in the first half, but when we fell behind in the third period and then went man-to-man defensively, that is when Cardinal Mooney caught fire,” said East coach Mark Cherol.

“We were able to hang with them on the boards and that was a real positive, however, careless mistakes when we had the ball and unforced turnovers really hurt,” said Cherol.

The game featured five ties and seven lead changes and with the score knotted the last time at 33-all at the 2:54 mark of the third quarter, Reese scored nine of his team’s next 11 points to open a 44-33 advantage and a lead they would not relinquish the rest of the way.

“As bad as we played in the first half we still only trailed by two points at halftime,” said Kohl.

“Reese is as complete a basketball player as I have ever been around. He goes inside, can shoot from the outside, plays defense and cashes in on his free throws,” Kohl added.

Seven points by Doug Caputo and six by Reese in the final period keyed a 20-8 run for the Cardinals (5-0).

Cardinal Mooney held a 35-33 rebound advantage with the Panthers’ Johnson and the Cardinals’ P.J. Quinn hauling down a game-high eight caroms.

East committed 21 turnovers while the Cardinals coughed it up 14 times; the latter also registering five blocks, including a game best three by Caputo.