#8 Colonials slip past #9 Fitchburg
Reese, Cruz lead Shrewsbury in a 60-59 thriller
by Christian Bradley, beantownhoops.com Central Mass correspondent
Fitchburg, MA-In a game where Shrewsbury jumped out to a 17-4 lead in the first quarter, followed by a 34-10 run by Fitchburg to end the first half in favor of Red Raiders, it was only right that this one came down to the last possession.
Shrewsbury started off the game with some hot shooting, quickly taking an 11-0 lead a couple minutes into the game. Their 2-3 zone really had Fitchburg struggling in the opening minutes. Senior captain Colby Reese came out of the gates firing, nailing two 3-pointers during the 17-4 run to start the game.
Shrewsbury Senior Colby Reese prepares to pull up for one of his three 3rd quarter 3-pointers
Another Senior, Jose Cruz, made his presence felt in a variety of ways; grabbing several rebounds and hitting his teammates for assists, to go along with 13 points in all.
However, Fitchburg’s shooting woes didn’t continue past the first few minutes of the game, and the Red Raiders stormed back; thanks in part to Sophomore Abi Akanni(17 points) and Senior Adam Vazquez, who made his presence felt off the bench with 19 points.
“Akanni and Vazquez really ignited them, we knew they weren’t going to go away,” Shrewsbury coach Adrian Machado said of the Red Raiders 2nd quarter run.
The Red Raiders didn’t go away, moving the ball well on offense to beat Shrewsbury’s 2-3 zone as well as bringing more intensity on defense, capped off by two blocks and a defensive rebound on one Shrewsbury possession late in the 2nd quarter by Vazquez.
Senior Adam Vazquez gets his second consecutive blocked shot in the 2nd quarter.
Despite not being able to hit early, Fitchburg had the lead at halftime, 38-27.
To the surprise of no one in the stands, Reese, fresh off scoring his 1000th point in Shrewsbury’s previous game, came out in the second half firing, again. His three 3-pointers in the 3rd quarter led the Colonials second half comeback and ultimately his 20 points on six 3’s in all was the top scoring performance of the evening.
“Colby played the way I knew he could tonight, he played like a senior. The kid’s got a great passion for the game and he really showed it tonight,” a proud Coach Machado commented on his seniors’ performance.
Off of Vazquez’ third blocked shot of the game, that was sent out of bounds with 4:15 left in the game, Shrewsbury executed an out of bounds play perfectly with just 2 seconds left on the shot clock and Cruz scored on an open layup to tie the game at 54.
Though Cruz kept his team in the game throughout the night with his eight assists and nine rebounds, it was his scoring heroics in the final minutes that helped win it for Shrewsbury.
Vazquez and Akanni followed with some scoring of their own, taking back the lead 59-56.
But Cruz wouldn’t let his team stay down for long, tying the game on an old-fashioned 3-point play with 59 seconds left in the 4th quarter.
“Colby and Jose have been with me for four years now, they’ve stepped up time and time again, and they did some big things for us tonight,” Shrewsbury’s coach continued.
With the game tied at 59 with 14 seconds left, Shrewsbury called a timeout. Reese pulled up for three off the inbounds pass and missed, but Junior Wil Machalski was there to grab the offensive rebound, and was fouled on the attempted putback.
Machalski, proving to be the unsung hero of the game, made one of two at the line to put the Colonials ahead of Fitchburg 60-59.
Junior Wil Machalski’s clutch free throw at the end of the game gave Shrewsbury the 60-59 victory.
With this win, Shrewsbury surpasses Fitchburg (9-2 in conference) in the loss column and takes command of Mid-Wach A with a conference record of 9-1.