Jan 15, 2025
Staff photo / Dan Hiner Kennedy’s Henry Phillips (3) attempts a shot over Canfield’s Ray McCune during the first quarter of a game on Tuesday at John F. Kennedy High School.
WARREN — Tuesday night’s game at Warren JFK became a battle of attrition.
Canfield’s defense created turnovers and forced Kennedy to dig deep to stay competitive, and the Cardinals won a battle of the birds, 59-46.
“I thought our pressure wore them down over time and wore them down over time,” Canfield head coach Andy Vlajkovich said. “I thought in the second half, we were able to clamp down a little bit. We used our depth and our full-court pressure.”
Canfield came out hot, scoring the game’s first 11 points. But Kennedy battled back.
Nick Ryan drove to the basket, fought through contact and scored a layup to put the Eagles up 12-11 with just under two minutes to play in the first quarter.
Christian Swogger scored on a buzzer-beating layup to end the first and put the Eagles ahead 17-15.
The team’s exchanged buckets and the lead over the course of the second quarter. However, a 3-pointer from Swogger gave JFK a 33-32 lead with a minute left in the half.
The Eagles were without a couple players due to injury and illness, so head coach Mark Komlanc was pleased his team fought back against a good Canfield squad.
“They battled with eight guys (playing for Canfield). Physical, in your face, going at you the entire game, so with just five guys, I felt that wore us down a little bit,” Komlanc said. “Second half, I think they were tired. Shots just weren’t quite where they wanted them to be.”
Canfield began the third quarter with an 11-2 run, which was snapped by a layup from Dom Ryan with 4:41 left in the period. The Cardinals held the Eagles (8-4) to five points in the third and took a 50-38 lead into the fourth.
Part of Canfield’s defensive improvement in the second half was a byproduct of Bryce Roberts’ play against Nick Ryan. The Eagles’ leading scorer, Ryan was held to a 3-pointer and a pair of free throws in the second half.
“(Roberts) didn’t shoot the ball particularly well tonight,” Vlajkovich said. “I jokingly told him at halftime, he might have broke the record for most rimouts. He had the ball halfway down a couple times, and he looked frustrated, but he’s the kinda kid who took his energy and focused on the defensive end. That’s a really unselfish and mature thing to do for a young kid.”
The Cardinals slowed things down in the final eight minutes. Swinging the ball around the halfcourt to find an open shot.
“We play really unselfishly,” Canfield’s Ben Weaver said. “We want to get the ball to each other because we know we can all score. We know the longer we move it, defenses don’t want to stay in the possession that long. We know we’ll get a free one sooner or later.”
Weaver led the Cardinals (13-1) with 17 points, Jake Delisio added 14 points and Roberts chipped in 12 points.
Nick Ryan led all scorers with 22 points. Dom Ryan was the Eagles’ other double-digit scorer with 10 points, and Henry Phillips finished with nine points.
The Cardinals have won seven straight after suffering their only loss of the season to New Albany.
“It’s been amazing, it’s been everything we expected,” Weaver said. “We dropped one game, but as a team and a program collectively, it’s been really great. We have a nice system going on, all the players are getting along and we’re playing very well together.”
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