By Michael Letendre
BRISTOL – A little confidence could go a long way for the Bristol Eastern boys basketball team this year.
And the Lancers big 54-24 runaway win against Plainville in Bristol on Thursday night will help the program in that quest.
History was also made at the Thomas M. Monahan Gymnasium that evening.
The thirty-point victory over Plainville was the largest opening night win ever in program history while the 24 points scored by the Blue Devils were the fewest the Lancers have ever given up in an opener.
Credit the zone defense Eastern employed in the second half, allowing the home team to blunt Plainville’s quickness, stuffing the middle and before anyone knew it, a manageable six point deficit became a 26-point hole the visiting aggression was never able to crawl out of.
Over the final 11:14 of the game, Plainville was limited to just two points as Eastern’s zone was simply too much to handle.
The Blues Devils compounded their problems by going 0-for-11 from three-point territory.
“It became kind of necessary,” said Eastern coach Bunty Ray of the zone. “We couldn’t stay with their quickness. They had a lot of ball handlers out front. They got to the rim, and they ran good sets. We were empty on our end. It was hard to dig in and we just needed a change of pace.”
Eastern turned defense into offense as the Blue Devils didn’t have many answers once the pressure was turned on.
The Lancers were just a few baskets away from shooting 50-percent from the field over second-half play and there was scoring balance up and down the roster.
Lukas Sward went 5-of-8 from the field, cashing in on a game-high 13 points while adding three rebounds.
Nate Fries chipped in nine points and a career-high tying five rebounds and while Brayden Dauphinais had a tough shooting night, he never relented – adding five points, six rebounds, three assists and a couple blocked shots over a good effort.
And then there was Zaveyn Tate’s first career start in which the sophomore absolutely crushed it.
He supplied seven points, a team-high 11 rebounds, three blocks, a few steals and was passing the ball all over the court to set up his teammates.
Eastern’s bench was absolutely tremendous, pumping in 20 points between Dante DePass (career-high eight points, four rebounds), Jordan Chisholm (six points, four rebounds, three assists), Isaiah Lawrence-Bynum (four points, two rebounds) and Naseem Walker (two points).
“I’m just glad the bench got to be in the rotation,” said DePass. “It’s important to get the starters a quick breather and I’m just happy the bench is there for them.”
The Blue Devils were pesky over first half play as Roman Lee scored five of his team-high seven points in the first period which gave the home squad early fits.
Two free throws by Lee with 3:26 left in the first fame gave Plainville an 8-4 edge.
Two hoops from Dauphinais led to an 7-1 run but a late steal and hoop by Plainville tied things up at 11-11 through one.
“If we had made some shots earlier, I thought we could have probably loosened ourselves up,” said Ray. “We were playing tight through that first half.”
The Lancers trailed early in the second period, but DePass drained back-to-back threes for the Lancers with his second trifecta giving Eastern an 18-15 edge with 3:20 left in the half.
That second unit, with DePass’s latter three, helped to give the Kingstreeters the lead for good.
“Starters are starters but we’re a team,” said Ray. “I sell to the kids every time [that] we’ll start some guys based on certain match-ups but once the game starts, we’re going to go to whomever we need to.”
Fries hit two late baskets, included an and-1, to end the half but Plainville was hanging around at intermission, trailing just 23-17 until Eastern unleashed its zone defense over third quarter play.
Plainville’s Brady Wieczorek (four points) hit a leaner early in the third, trimming the deficit to 25-19, but the team ran out of answers soon after.
Sward dumped seven points during Eastern’s 15-0 blitzing to end the third tilt and when Chisholm popped in a dagger 3 at the buzzer, Eastern was in control at 40-22.
“The pace was going up and down but not in our favor,” said Ray. “We were going crazy. We weren’t settling in, and I thought the zone stopped Plainville from going fast, it stopped us from going fast and they started missing at the end. They got tired because they aren’t deep and then we got our run-outs.”
And the fun continued into the fourth quarter as Sward opened the stanza with a blistering 3.
Fries then put back a miss, Chisholm found Tate for a bucket and off two free throws and another field goal by Sward, Eastern was in complete charge at 50-22 with 4:44 to go – netting the first 10 fourth period points as part of a bigger 25-3 run.
Tate and Sward ended the showdown with hoops and at the final horn, it was Eastern getting to the pay window via the thirty-point blitzing.
“It feels good,” said DePass about the opening night win. “It’s always nice to get off to a fast start in the season. Of course, in this conference it’s a tough conference. It feels good to start 1-0.”
Bristol Eastern Boys Basketball – CCC South Action
BRISTOL EASTERN 54, PLAINVILLE 24
from the Thomas M. Monahan Gymnasium, Bristol
Plainville (0-1) 11 6 5 2 – 24
Bristol Eastern (1-0) 11 12 17 14 – 54
PLAINVILLE (24): Roman Lee 2 3 7, Brady Wieczorek 2 0 4, Christian Mafia 0 0 0, Jayden Castro 0 0 0, Reggie Gonzales 1 1 3, Joseph Vasquez 2 0 4, Michael Bakaysa 0 0 0, Jon Kafka 0 0 0, Nathan Saucier 1 0 2, Nijaz Srdanovic 1 0 2, Golden Tate 1 0 2. Totals: 10 4 24.
BRISTOL EASTERN (54): Naseem Walker 1 0 2, Nate Fries 4 1 9, Jordan Chisholm 2 0 6, Cheniel Serrano 0 0 0, Lukas Sward 5 2 13, Brady Bell 0 0 0, Dante DePass 3 0 8, Ben D’Amato 0 0 0, Zaveyn Tate 3 1 7, Brayden Dauphinais 2 1 5, Isaiah Lawrence-Bynum 2 0 4. Totals: 22 5 54.
Three-point goals: Chisholm (BE) 2, Sward (BE), DePass (BE) 2.
Records: Bristol Eastern 1-0; Plainville 0-1
