North boys win in final seconds

Byrd shot helps Florio win debut

By Bob Nuse, Sports Editor
  With the score tied and 10 seconds left, first-year West Windsor-Plainsboro North boys’ basketball coach Dale Florio was confident his team would pull out a win.
   ”I could see it in their eyes at the time out that we were not going to lose the game,” said Florio, whose team got a basket from Brandon Byrd with three seconds left to top Allentown, 41-39, in their season opener on Friday night. “They were not a team that was figuring out how they were going to lose. They felt like they were going to win. And we played the last 10 seconds exactly like we were going to win the game. It’s a game we can build on.”
   For Florio, who was making his head coaching debut, the win showed him his team was not going to back down in a tough spot. But he also knows it is just one game in a long season and there is still a lot of work to be done.
   ”I could tell the kids felt good about themselves because they’ve worked real hard,” said Florio, whose team will play at WW-P South tonight at 7:30 p.m. “We still have a lot to work on. The turnovers were in the acceptable range because most of them were aggressive turnovers. We still have to work on keeping our defensive intensity for a full 32 minutes. And we’re a small team, so we really need to work on blocking out.”
   Darren Allen led a balanced scoring attack for the Knights with 11 points, while Byrd had seven and Evan Mitos added six. And in a game that was close throughout, it was the Knights who made the big shot at the end.
   ”It was nip and tuck the whole game,” Florio said. “I don’t think either team ever had more than a four-point edge.”
   With the score tied and less than a minute to play, the Knights ran the clock down to 10 seconds and called a time out.
   ”We set up a play and regardless of who got it, we had three options,” Florio said. “The idea was to take the ball to the basket. Brandon got the ball and made a running one-hander. They still had just under three seconds, but we held them.”
   Now the 1-0 Knights face a big test when they play at WW-P South, which lost its opener to Trenton on Friday.
   ”It’s going to be exciting,” Florio said. “I had a chance to talk to (South coach) Bob Schurtz and he gave me a sense of what to expect out of the game. It sounds like it will be a great community event and an exciting atmosphere.”
   After pulling out a two-point win on a shot in the closing seconds, the Knights know all about winning in an exciting atmosphere.