Boys basketball: North Brunswick uses size advantage in win over Edison
NORTH BRUNSWICK — Statistics don’t always tell the story of a basketball game but one set of numbers certainly was significant in North Brunswick’s 50-47 decision over Edison on Thursday: North Brunswick’s fourth-quarter rebounding edge of 13-5, four to one on the offensive boards.
The Raiders’ size advantage proved to be the major difference in overcoming Edison’s feisty play and a 22-point outburst by the Eagles’ Rickey Harvey.
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“I felt like we had the size over them and we knew we had to rebound to win, just like every game,” offered junior forward Jack Garbolino. “We just came out, played big and won the game.”
Harvey may have delivered the shot of the year in a third quarter-ending heave from behind the basket in the deep right corner after chasing down a bad pass for three, but North Brunswick’s Juwel Hoagland provided the shot of the night.
Hoagland tracked down his own missed free throw and deposited it in the hoop for a four-point play that capped a 10-2 Raiders spurt early in the fourth that put the home side on top to stay.
“We have guys that really want to crash the boards a lot and they were really active in the fourth quarter,” North Brunswick coach Raheem Byrom said. “I put a little pressure on them and told them they have to crash the boards in the fourth quarter because that was the only way we were going to win. These little guys (Edison) were active, they jump out of the gym, they’re very athletic, so we had to come some type of way.”
North Brunswick (10-7, 7-3) headed north last week for non-conference games against Elizabeth and Irvington, two teams that apply tenacious man-to-man pressure, and it took a couple of minutes to adjust to Edison’s tamer 2-3 scheme. The Raiders increased their ball movement and overloaded the zone, but its best antidote was terrific interior passing, most notably of the big-to-big variety.
“When you see us run our interior passing and have our interior stuff being done that’s because we’re recognizing what we’re facing,” Byrom explained. “That’s when you see that high-low game, or the in-and-out or box-to-box, stuff like that.”
Garbolino had assists on three of North Brunswick’s five first-quarter field goals, all to Brandon McCain, and would have had two more had teammates finished properly.
“We were a little shocked when they came out in a 2-3 but we’ve played against it a lot all year, so our moving the ball and swinging it around was a little rusty,” Garbolino said. “I know Brandon McCain is going to be down low all of the time, we work high-low all day in practice. I knew we have that chemistry.”
McCain paced North Brunswick with 19 points and claimed 10 rebounds, while Garbolino contributed 10 boards and five assists as the Raiders owned a 33-21 rebound advantage for the evening.
McCain scored North Brunswick’s final basket off a feed from Hoagland for a 48-45 edge with a minute and a half to play. Harvey brought the Eagles (4-14, 1-11) within one following a pass from Dominic Innocenti with 1:15 to play but Edison missed a pair of free throws before turning the ball over twice in the final 6.3 seconds, the ball ending in Garbolino’s hands on a steal just before the buzzer that finally put the game to rest.
This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: NJ boys basketball: North Brunswick tops Edison
