Naples tops Pontes in the Steelton Pony Championships....

This was round 4 of the two top teams in the Steelton Pony league and it was another classic game for the books....
Today's game was played in front of a packed house of probably close to 300 people just to see some of the best 10 year olds in the area compete for the Steelton league championships....

Pontes won the regular season 1st place title with an 11 - 1 record going into the game...  Naples was 2nd place with a 10 - 2 record....   All of that stuff was thrown out the window because all that mattered was this last and final game.....

As the game started, Naples came out in a tough 2 - 3 zone and really focused on packing the defense inside to force Pontes to shoot from the outside so the two big guys Tyreese Smith and John Pogasic couldn't get the ball inside....   Pontes played a triangle and two defense on the top scorers for Naples, Jordan McCraw and Keyian Bullock...  

Both defenses seemed to bother both teams as both teams just couldn't get into a rhythm scoring only 2 points a piece in the first quarter....   What began to hurt Naples was Bullock and McCraw both got into foul trouble. That led them to sit on the bench for a little while...  Pontes just couldn't take advantage of that situation as Eric Dickie scored some key baskets for Pontes in the absence of the other players....

These teams went back and forth until the 4th quarter...  That's when Naples snapped out of it and shots started falling...  Bullock made a nice runner followed by a long jumper by McCraw as Naples started pulling away....   Once they went up by 5 points, they never looked back and pulled out a 33 - 24 victory making them the league champs....

That's the way to win because if you want to be the best, you got to beat the best....

McCraw led Naples with 14 points, Dickie scored 11pts and Bullock added 5pts.....   Pontes was led by Smith with 11 pts, Pogasic chipped in with 7 points and Donovin Medina scored 5pts...

I look forward to seeing these guys next year as they move up to the midget league and make some noise...