Ben Turnbull, who coaches East Hampton High’s boys winter track team, said in an email Monday that “this year’s team [numbering 20, most of them sophomores and freshmen] is more complete than last year’s. We have a good mix of distance runners, sprinters, jumpers, and, finally, some throwers.”
The boys debuted in a crossover meet at Suffolk Community College-Brentwood Saturday. The girls team, coached by Yani Cuesta, also competed there the next day, with three of her charges — Hanna Medler, Leah Hatch, and Penelope Greene — recording personal bests.
Meanwhile, the boys basketball team, which had begun the season with two straight wins in the Kendall Madison Tip-Off tournament, was “punched in the mouth,” in its coach Dan White’s words, by Half Hollow Hills West here Friday.
It was almost literally the case with Bonac’s senior point guard, Jeremy Vizcaino, who was mugged as he put up a shot near the end of the first quarter with East Hampton trailing 15-13. The resulting gash under his left eye forced him to the sidelines, blood dripping onto the floor as he did so.
No foul was called, to the amazement of White and Bonac’s fans, and, predictably, the game went south thereafter. Hills West, which the coach acknowledged was the stronger and quicker team, perhaps the best in East Hampton’s league, cruised to a 78-50 win.
Over the weekend, in a telephone conversation, East Hampton’s coach said he didn’t know when Vizcaino, whose cut was stitched up at Stony Brook Southampton Hospital, would be back.
In Vizcaino’s absence, Liam Leach and Frank Bellucci paired up at times with Luke Reese, a freshman whose gutsy play in the lost cause White said he greatly admired.
The visitors led by 7 after the first quarter, and by 18 at halftime, and so it went.
Reese, who was to lead the Bonackers with 12 points, was especially noticeable in the second quarter, drawing fouls on drives to the hoop.
Facing the Colts’ constant pressure, the Bonackers, who were to sorely miss Vizcaino, their leading scorer, did not shoot well that night.
Nor did they, White said, at Southold, a nonleague opponent, on Dec. 2. Nevertheless, they won, 51-46, Leach leading the way with 16 points, followed by Vizcaino with 13, Logan Gurney with 8, Reese with 8, Charlie Condon, the 6-foot-6-inch center, with 4, and Owen Ruddy with 2.
As for Friday’s game, Colby Jordan, Hills West’s point guard, finished with 25 points, and its tough inside man, Ryan Turner, finished with 19. Brent Bland, who hit three 3-pointers, finished with 13.
Afterward, White said that without Vizcaino at point guard it was very difficult to withstand the Colts’ pressure, and added that “Luke Reese played great for a ninth grader,” and that “Charlie and Travis [Wallace, who came off the bench] got better as the game went on.” In the final analysis, White said, Hills West was “faster, stronger, quicker . . . they’re probably the best team in the league.”
Biddy basketball, with third and fourth graders going from 8:30 to 10 a.m., fifth and sixth graders going from 10 to 11:30, and seventh and eighth graders going from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., is to begin at the John M. Marshall Elementary School Saturday, under White’s aegis. “It’s the fourth year I’ve done this — I want to keep the ball rolling,” the varsity coach said.
Back to track, Turnbull said that Ben McErlean, a Pierson junior, had finished third and East Hampton’s Amari Jordan fourth in Sunday’s 1,000-meter race; that Luc Campbell, who captains the team with Jake Klarman, was the runner-up in the 55-meter hurdles and was eighth in the 300-meter dash; that Klarman had been fourth in the triple jump and ninth in the 600, and that Julian Link, in the 55 hurdles, and Aminu Marin, in the shot-put, had each finished 10th.
As for the girls, Greene, a Pierson junior who runs with East Hampton’s winter and spring teams, placed second in the 1,500, in a personal-best time of 5 minutes and 5.48 seconds. Hanna Medler’s heave of 22 feet 6 inches in the shot-put was also a personal best, as was Leah Hatch’s 8.97 in the 55-meter dash.
Cuesta has 14 on her squad. Greene, Ava Engstrom, Bella Espinoza, Lillie Minskoff, Hatch, and Mimi Fowkes are the returnees. The newcomers are Medler, Denise Analis, Daniella Chavez, Maddie Gaibor, Stephanie Garcia, Joana Gutierrez, Summer Klarman, and Reiley Segelken.