Rice Raiders reign

They worked against the press in practice, but having coached a similar team himself just two years prior, Holy Cross Coach Paul Gilvary knew there was no way to accurately produce the conditions of what it would be like when his Knights met Rice.
“The team I had with Kevin Ogletree and Michael Johnson and Anthony Clarke and Gordon McKenzie is a lot like this,” he said after the Raiders forced 19 turnovers and had five players reach double figures in an 83-72 win over Holy Cross at the Gauchos Gym in the Bronx Sunday afternoon. “We gave teams fits in the league because of how fast we were.
“The problem when you are playing against a team that fast, you can’t simulate that in practice,” he continued. “There is nothing you can do in practice that properly prepares you for what the game is going to be like.”
The Knights seemed to eventually adjust to the warp speed of the Raiders’ four-guard lineup, but ultimately failed to execute down the stretch. They eliminated a nine-point first half deficit, going up 43-39 early in the third quarter after Sylven Landesberg knocked in a 3-pointer from the left wing. Ranked 18th in USA Today, Rice turned up the pressure, reeling off an 11-2 run, giving them the lead for good.
“They kept throwing more and more pressure at us,” point guard Blaise Ffrench said. “We weren’t able to handle it.”
“We understand the way they play the game now, how fast they are,” Landesberg said. “We were told that, but we didn’t really believe it. Now we see how fast they are.”
Lamont Jones led Rice (13-2, 7-0 CHSAA AA West) with 22 points, Dorvell Carter added 14, Chris Fouche had 13 and Durand Scott and Kemba Walker each had 11. Landesberg paced Holy Cross with a game-high 25 and Kayvon Roberts chipped in with 21.
The Knights (12-3, 3-2 CHSAA AA East) would twice get within four in the final eight minutes, but each time the Raiders answered. First, it was Kemba Walker scoring in transition following a Landesberg turnover, then after again narrowing the deficit back to two possessions on a Roberts’ floater with four minutes remaining, Ffrench was whistled for a charge in transition, Landesberg shot an air ball, and Rice scored 13 of the next 18 points.
“Really, the last four or five minutes of the game, there were probably four or five key plays,” Gilvary said, “and today, I give Rice credit, they made all of them.”
There was no moral victory talk afterward. That Holy Cross played the Raiders - a team that had beaten two of the nation’s top programs in Niagara Falls and Simeon (Chicago) in the past week - close on a night they played “not one of our better games,” as Landesberg rated the performance, was not of much significance.
“It might help us prepare for next time … but we still lost the game,” Landesberg said. “A loss is a loss regardless.”