By Michael Letendre

BURLINGTON – A strange year got even more so on Friday night when the Bristol Central boys basketball team faced a second straight opponent this week without its head coach.

Lewis Mills coach Ryan Raponey was in COVID protocol and basically coached from home, communicating with his team at various points of the game.

And the contest was a single-digit affair midway through the final period before Central strung together several hoops to stave off the Spartans by a 70-51 final from the Thunderdome at Lewis Mills High School in Burlington.

The Rams ended up clinching the Central Connecticut Conference Region B title and is undefeated (10-0) with New Britain and Bristol Eastern remaining on the schedule and hopefully, those games will be played next week.

Central’s Donovan Clingan put together another tremendous showing, posting 30 points, 15 rebounds, seven blocks, and three assists.

But it wasn’t just the All-State standout that hit for double-figures at Mills.

Sean Wininger made the Spartans pay when doubling Clingan, zipping in 13 points while teammate Damion Glasper flashed in 11 over a balanced offense attack.

“He got off to a really good start,” said Central coach Tim Barrette of Wininger. “He’d been quiet the last couple of games, quieter than we are used to. He really hasn’t been looking for his offense. Sean can score. He’s a good offensive player. He’s been doing a great job for us on the boards all year but he came through tonight when they paid a lot of attention to Donovan and the way they were playing us. I thought [Wininger] and Damion were phenomenal tonight.”

Eli Rodriguez and Carson Rivoira each canned six points while D’Ante Ross added four for the winners.

Central guard Victor Rosa did not score but played a tough brand of ball on both sides of the floor.

Brice Waldron led the Lewis Mills charge with 13 points, Drew Cormier added 11 while Nate DiChiara and John Schibi each chipped in with nine.

And the returning Tommy Martinotti nabbed eight points as the Spartans share the wealth offense helped keep things relatively close at the half.

“Offensively, what we were trying to do was obviously spread [Central] out,” said Lewis Mills coach Ryan Raponey via phone. “We know they have a guy in the middle that is going to alter shots. And we know they are going to put pressure on us. So the idea is to spread the floor, move the ball and look for opportunities to drive it, then to kick it and make the extra pass.”

“In the first half, we did a solid job – especially in that first quarter – of executing, making the right reads. Yeah, you’re going to get blocked a couple times but knowing when to go in and get the mid-range and knowing when to kick it out and then to make the pass for shots [is critical]. I thought we did a solid job.”

Two ties and three lead changes highlighted a competitive first eight minutes of play but Schibi kicked in a late 3 and when a leaner from Martinotti fell in at the buzzer, Mills went up, 15-12.

Central opened up second quarter play with a 19-7 burst that turned a three point deficit to a nine point edge (31-22) with 2:10 left before the half.

Clingan scored 13 points in the run, Glasper added two buckets and Rivoira scooped in a lay-up to give the visitors a boost during that game-changing run.

A three from DiChiara and a jumper by Waldron cut the deficit to six late but a slick floater from Glasper ended the first half scoring with Central securing a 35-27 push at the half.

In the opening stages of the third period, Central’s hi-low offense paid dividends as the Rams when on an 8-3 run as Clingan hit a neat hook shot and Wininger drained two 3s to push the score out to 43-30 with 4:45 remaining in the stanza.

“You’re placed in a difficult situation when you play Bristol Central because you know that Donovan is the lightning rod,” said Raponey. “He’s going to get the attention. So the first time around [on February 26], we played him straight up, man-to-man, and we were able to get him into foul trouble which kept him out of the game. Today, we were unable to do that so we had to pick our poison defensively. The plan going in was to put some pressure on the guards, to put some pressure on the guys up top that are usually trying to feed him the ball and then allow him to negotiate offense whether it was one-on-one or for him to attack the double-teams with kick-outs.”

“Today, when they were able to get the ball moving around…the fallout of that was Wininger getting a couple threes on rotation and, unfortunately, he knocks some down and we have to deal with that in those situations.”

But Mills charged back as DiChiara blasted in his third 3 of the night, Waldron was there for another basket and when a jumper by Cormier sailed in with 2:40 to go in the third, the Spartans trailed just 43-37.

But off consecutive misses, Central cashed in on two offensive rebounds and Rodriguez (six points) canned a huge 3 with 27.4 seconds to play in the third to stretch out the lead back to 13 at 50-37.

“We just have to play through everything,” said Barrette. “Mills is going to make shots. They came out [and] they shoot the ball well, especially here at home. They made shots early but obviously, our advantage is inside and when you can go and score on seventy-percent inside, it’s very difficult for a team that is going to shoot 3s if they are not making all of them.”

It was a 50-40 game through three quarters but when Rivoira and Glasper chucked in back-to-back lay-ups with 5:05 left in the game, Central surged in front, 56-42.

Mills simply refused to yield as Martinotti put a missed shot back in and off another Schibi three, the contest was a nine-point game at 56-47 with 4:08 to go.

“I have to credit my coaching staff,” said Raponey. “Obviously, it’s a very tough situation with me being placed in quarantine, not being able to coach. Coach [Mike] O’Keefe, coach [Rich] Klett, and coach Vitali together did a solid job. Coach O’Keefe kind of took the lead and just kept making the right calls and kept guys motivated on the floor.”

“I was able to talk to players in pregame, at halftime, and I obviously talked to them postgame but you’re not there at the game so for your guys to stay competitive and to continue to battle without [the head coach] being there, it makes you proud of, not just your players, but of your coaching staff for being able to get that out of the guys.”

But Clingan made it a moot point as he dropped in a dunk, put back his own miss, and hit two nifty hook shots – the latter becoming an and-1 with a minute to play. With that burst the Rams scooped up a 65-47 cushion as Clingan tallied his 30th point of the evening.

“You go to your bread and better when you need to,” said Barrette of Clingan. “We talk about it all the time. I thought Eli made a great pass to him with about six minutes to go. Rodriguez got trapped and he threw it to Donovan who scored on the baseline. When you have one of the best players in the state, you have to give the ball to him in crunch time.”

Late free throws chopped the deficit to 15 but in the end, Central hung on to snare an impressive 70-51 victory to stay perfect against a very capable squad from Burlington.

“They play hard every time,” said Barrette of Lewis Mills. “They’re well coached. I feel bad for coach Raponey in quarantine tonight. But he instilled his work ethic. He’s always been a worker, his team is a worker, those guys are smart, they play smart and you’ll never be able to come into Lewis Mills and get an easy victory.”

“We knew that from the start [but] our guys were ready to go tonight as well.”

CCC Region B boys basketball

BRISTOL CENTRAL 70, LEWIS MILLS 51

from the Thunderdome at Lewis Mills high school, Burlington

Bristol Central (10-0) 12 23 15 20 – 70

Lewis Mills (2-8) 15 12 13 11 – 51

BRISTOL EASTERN (70): Damion Glasper 5 1 11, Eli Rodriguez 1 3 6, D’Ante Ross 2 0 4, Sean Wininger 5 0 13, Carson Rivoira 3 0 6, Donovan Clingan 14 2 30, Tre Jones 0 0 0, Dom Amara 0 0 0, Mason Stokes 0 0 0. Totals: 30 6 70.

LEWIS MILLS (51): Nate DiChiara 3 0 9, Tommy Martinotti 3 1 8, Jacob Lomnicky 0 0 0, Colby Cables 0 0 0, Drew Cormier 5 0 11, Brice Waldron 3 7 13, Logan Cowger 0 0 0, John Schibi 3 0 9, David Owens 0 0 0, Ryan Mayes 0 0 0, Charlie Joiner 0 0 0, Jack Stanislaw 0 0 0. Totals: 17 8 51.

Three-point goals: Rodriguez (BC), Sean Wininger (BC) 3, DiChiara (LM) 3, T. Martinotti (LM), Cormier (LM), Schibi (LM) 3, Waldron (LM).

Records: Bristol Central 10-0 overall; Lewis Mills 2-8