Panthers rout St. Joe's at MLK Classic
by PATRICK J. NAGY Reporter

The Sweet Home boys basketball team looked like its old self against St. Joe's last Saturday at Hutch- Tech.

The Panthers ran off the first 10 points of the game en route to a convincing 74-53 win over the Marauders as part of the MLK Classic. St. Joe's was ranked fifth in Western New York large schools; Sweet Home was unranked.

"It was our best effort of the year," said Sweet Home coach Paul Schintzius. "It felt like we were playing Sweet Home ball again. You couldn't have scripted it any better."

Schintzius could tell his team was ready by the way they were playing in warm-ups.

"They all came back to the bench with a sweat going," said Schintzius. "They looked focused and ready to go. I could tell by their body language that they weren't just there to compete. They wanted to win."

Senior Ali Ramadan paced the Panthers in the first quarter, scoring 11 points on a combination of jump shots, layups and bank shots. Ramadan finished with 21. Sweet Home was ahead, 18-11, at the end of the first quarter.

In the second quarter, it was Jamel Werts' turn to churn out the points. The senior guard scored 13 of his 22 in the quarter, including three three-pointers, to extend the Panthers' advantage to 39-25.

St. Joe's Matt Spitler (24 points) hit a couple of deep threes to help cut its deficit to 55-45 after the third quarter but Schintzius said his team never allowed the lead to get under double digits.

Sweet Home's also got good contributions from Donny Watkins (13 points), Marcus Johnson (eight points, held St. Joe's Phil Scaffidi to eight) and Brian Pappagallo (six points).

It was the Panthers' first game in eight days. Its scheduled game at Hamburg last Tuesday was postponed because of snow to Tuesday. The result was unavailable before The Bee went to press.

Win or lose Sweet Home (8-4, 5-0) travels to Williamsville South for a 7:30 p.m. tip-off on Friday.