Rams and Lady Rams stagger through hoops losses, but eye winter season's improvement in the new year
December 20, 2023 at 11:51 p.m.
This was the week that was for Port Chester's basketball Rams and Lady Rams, and it wasn't pretty although it did have its moments, albeit not enough of them.
The Rams, for example, lost their latest game, a 71-34 blowout to New Rochelle at home last Thursday (12/14), no disgrace really because New Ro is one of Westchester's top 10 teams as was Ossining, another top-ranked squad that outclassed Port Chester earlier in the season by racking up another 30-point-plus romp against the locals that resulted in a 67-32 loss.
The numbers game
In both those games, the Rams main—and really only—offensive threat was senior Guillermo (Memo) Zabala who scored 25 against Ossining and 30 against New Ro, and does it all, or almost all, for Port Chester.
And that's the trouble, or at least the main part of it.
Zabala almost single-handedly brings the ball up court, runs the offense as point guard, scores most of the points as shooting guard, passes like a quarterback, shoots like a star, drives like an Indy racer, and you get the idea why he is the Rams’ only senior returning All-Conference player because he stays cool, calm and collected while trying to get his teammates involved.
But that doesn't happen. Because without Zabala, the Rams have trouble inbounding, bringing the ball up court, working the ball with any kind of precision, passing with any kind of accuracy, hitting from outside with any degree of consistency, even just boxing out under the boards so rebounds would be more than a passing fancy.
And that isn't their fault.
The basic problem
"They're good athletes, just not good basketball players, because Port Chester doesn't have any real youth basketball training programs, no travel teams, and no real interest in doing anything about it," according to a longtime Rams coach, an ex-Ram player back in the day who still bleeds blue-and-white Port Chester pride. "Don Bosco used to have a youth program, but after the COVID pandemic, that stopped, and the player pipeline to the varsity stopped as well. Some of us tried to hold meetings to do something about starting up a new early basketball training program., but there was no real interest, no real community-wide support."
We’re quoting him and giving him anonymity so he could be frank and because he is right while saying what just recently retired basketball coach Manny Martinez has been saying for the past five years—without an early varsity training youth pipeline, it is going to be impossible to turn around a losing Port Chester basketball culture no matter how much headway coaches make.
"We need early travel teams playing fast-paced AAU off-season ball," said the coach watching New Rochelle, taller, leaner, hungrier, faster, more talented and more disciplined, running rings around the Rams with Zabala the lonely and only Port Chester player capable of giving them a run for their money.
On the move again
"Move the ball, move it," new Rams coach Greg Cole kept shouting, and to their credit, the ball was moving better than it has in the past. But that is damning with faint praise. Because the answer comes down to basic math, not advanced calculus. You can't expect the Rams to compete against the New Ro's and Ossinings, two of the area's stronger established basketball programs, without the basic training, without the fundamentals drilled into them early on. It is like asking them to do AP calculus without ever having taken algebra, geometry, basic trigonometry. You can't skip those steps and come up with the right answer without that foundation. And that's the bottom line.
Which is why you have to admire the Rams for trying so hard and playing so hard, even with the deck stacked against them. But at least they do have their ace in Zabala, a transfer from the Dominican Republic, who learned the game in the Dominican playing age-group basketball across the Caribbean before moving to Port Chester. And they will be getting some help under the boards because Joey Ciciriello, a big, bulky baseball pitcher/first baseman, is out of his walking boot after a leg injury and will be coming back to hoops soon. But unless the Rams get in a lot of practice over the holiday break and drill on the fundamentals of defense, rebounding and passing, it is going to be a long season for Cole, a former three-time All-Section player at Sleepy Hollow who became a Division 3 collegiate All-American at Southern Connecticut and has replaced Martinez, his father-in-law, as the Rams’ new coach.
Cole has been around long enough to know that misses are part of the game, and he can live with that as long as his team hustles, plays defense and hits the boards. Because if they do that, the offense will eventually pick up and the Rams will show progress even though they seem to be a perpetual work in progress. But not due to any lack of trying.
Lady Rams losses
The Lady Rams also had their hoop problems during the past week, losing a deuce in the Mamaroneck Tournament by scores of 77-36 to Nyack last Thursday (12/14) and bowing to the home team 59-46 Saturday (12/16). But while the scores might not show it, the Lady Rams did play solid basketball with senior Samantha (Sam) Munoz, one of the school's most consistently underrated athletes (soccer, softball), scoring 16 points in the opener against Nyack (along with six assists and five rebounds) and nine (with seven rebounds and three assists) in the Mamaroneck loss.
Munoz was selected for the All-Tournament Team and was the Rams’ tournament MVP and eighth-grader McKayla McLoughlin continued to impress and improve as the team's scrappy point guard. She hit for 16 points with seven assists and five rebounds against Mamaroneck.
But what was most impressive was the way the Danny Davis-coached team never lost their poise, kept working the ball, diving for loose balls and fighting for rebounds, and never gave up with strong play coming from Nagare Jones, Karah Provenzano, Elise Thomas, Nataly Garcia, Analia Sosa and Alyssa Gagnon.
So both the Rams and Lady Rams still have a long way to go to get to where they want to be—and a long way to go to match the pro basketball Pacers who have lost 21 straight games at this writing, are 2-24 on the season so far and look like strong contenders to break the NBA record of 26 consecutive Ls, an infamous mark shared by the 76ers (2010-11) and the Trail Blazers (2014). Both Port Chester teams are looking for a fresh start and a happier new year in 2024 when the Rams come back from the winter season break with an away game Jan. 3, a Wednesday, at 5 p.m. against an Ossining team that beat them by more than 30 points earlier in the season while the Lady Rams are up against a strong Ossining team at home at 5 p.m. That's far from an easy startup, but you have to start somewhere.
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