Panther boys’ basketball team faces nemesis next
By: Bob Nuse
When your team wins its opening-round game in the state tournament by 30 points, there are plenty of things to be happy about.
For Princeton Day School boys’ basketball coach Ahmed El-Nokali, Wednesday’s 60-30 win over Wardlaw-Hartridge went as well as he could have hoped.
"I was happy with what I saw," said El-Nokali, whose team advanced to the quarterfinals of the state Prep B tournament, where they will face Morristown-Beard at 2 p.m. on Sunday. "We had played them last week and won easily. I liked the way our starters came out focused. I told them that no matter what the situation I want us to play the same way."
El-Nokali played his starting five in just the first and third quarters on Wednesday, outscoring Wardlaw 42-2 when that group was on the floor. In a situation where it would have been easy to lose focus, the Panthers never did.
"We know we have to take care of the ball and execute and this was a good chance for us to get ready for our next game," said sophomore guard Drew Godwin, who finished with 10 points. "That’s what we try to do. We want to execute and play as a team.
"We just try to execute our plays and play the best game we can. We had just played this team and we knew that what we needed to do was take care of the ball and execute."
The Panthers jumped out to an 18-0 lead in the first quarter and were never seriously threatened. Wardlaw managed to close to within 20-12 just before halftime, but a three-point shot by Vikram Gupta at the buzzer pushed the lead back to 11 points. By the time Wardlaw scored its first point against the PDS starters with three seconds left in the third quarter, the lead had grown to 47-12.
"I was happy that the guys never lost focus no matter what the score was or who was in the game," said El-Nokali, whose team improved to 13-8 on the season. "This was a game where they could have lost their focus, but these guys aren’t like that. They are hard workers and that makes it easy for me. We had our toughest practice of the season (Tuesday) and the guys went hard the whole time.
"It’s a lot easier for me when I have guys like this that want to work and want to get better. It’s a good group to work with."
Now the Panthers have to go up against their nemesis from the past two seasons in Mo-Beard. Each of the last two years PDS has been knocked out of the Prep B tournament by Mo-Beard.
"Last year we played them in the second round and they beat us," Godwin said. "Hopefully we can change that this year."
El-Nokali hasn’t had the chance to coach against Mo-Beard yet, but he understands the task won’t be easy.
"The last two years this is the team that has knocked us out, so there is a little extra motivation there," he said. "I think our guys will be ready to play. We have our last home game (Thursday against Solomon Schecter) and then a couple days to practice and get ready."
In a way, Wednesday’s win was also like a practice for the Panthers.
"In a game like this we also had a chance to work on our zone," said El-Nokali, whose team was led by Dave Pepperman with 16 points on 8 of 9 shooting. "We don’t play it much and this was a chance to see how we would react in a game situation. It was nice to see the way they talked to each other and played so well together."
Now El-Nokali hopes that continues for a few more games.