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Sports

Peekskill-Cortlandt Patch Weekly Sports Report

Panzanaro remembers Fredette; Rebels earn tie; Giglio Games rescheduled

Rebels earn tie:

After losing to Kennedy/Putnam Valley 4-2 in its first meeting on Dec. 19, the Lakeland/Panas ice hockey squad was looking to even up the score in its contest against it on Feb. 4 at the Brewster Ice Arena.

The Rebels weren’t able to defeat Kennedy/Putnam Valley (10-5-2) but did the next best thing and that is tie the game late in the third period. A goal by the Rebels’ Sam Vaimberg with assists from Frank Celentano and Robert Caffrey earned Lakeland/Panas (7-6-2) a hard-fought 2-2 tie.

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A key to the Rebels win was the play of their defense, who made sure that the leader in goals scored in Section 1 with 31, Steven Santini, was held to zero goals.

“It was a big effort from our team,” Rebel coach Bart Mucci said. “We concentrated the whole thing on playing good team defense and keeping Steven Santini at bay. We pretty much were successful at defending him. He had just one assist on the night on the power play.”

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Caffrey, who is tied for tops in the section in points with 51 and second in goals with 30, got the Rebels on the scoreboard first with an unassisted goal in the opening period that put the Rebels up 1-0. Kennedy/Putnam Valley rallied with two goals in the third period to take a 2-1 lead.

Vaimberg though came up with his heroics to tie the game and send it into an overtime that saw neither team score.

“With 40 seconds left, we pulled the goalie, they actually had called timeout and we were able to set up a play,” Mucci said. “Caffrey took a shot from the top of the right circle and Vaimberg tipped it in.”

Doing his job in goal for the Rebels was Nick Chiapparino, who made 35 saves.

“The key is we gave up a lot of shots but most of them were perimeter shots,” Mucci said. “We gave up very few in high-traffic areas. He’s a very good goaltender so if he can see the puck, he is going to save it.”

Giglio Games rescheduled:

The Giglio Games, the all-day basketball extravaganza between Walter Panas and Lakeland, scheduled for Feb. 5, were postponed the day before because of the anticipated inclement weather.

The Games will now take place Saturday Feb. 12 at Lakeland, with the original game times still intact.

Panzanaro Remembers Fredette:

Brigham Young senior Jimmer Fredette has been all the rage in college basketball this winter as he leads the nation in scoring average with 27.6 points per game.

While college teams are having a hard time slowing him down, one local coach, for at least one day, was able to curtail him.

That coach was Peekskill boys basketball coach Lou Panzanaro, who coached the Red Devils to their fifth state championship by defeating Fredette and his Glens Falls Indians in the 2007 Class A state championship game at the Glens Falls Civic Center.

In a game played in front of a standing-room only crowd with an estimated 6,000 fans, Peekskill won 58-48 in a contest that was much closer than the final score indicated.

That year Fredette had averaged 28.8 points per game his senior season and graduated as New York State’s sixth all-time leading scorer with 2, 404 points so Panzanaro knew him and his squad were encountering a difficult challenge.

“We did not think he was stoppable because he had such good range and he was such a great shooter, just a natural touch,” Panzanaro said. “What we were doing was playing a 3-2 zone and anytime he moved to a side of the court, middle, the guy at the top had him, he took a step left they (Peekskill defenders) would both have him at a certain point. We just tried to stay in front of him and force him deeper and deeper away from the basket.”

That plan worked as Fredette had one of his worst shooting performances of his career as he was just 3-for-24 from the field including 2-for-16 from behind the 3-point arc. He finished with 19 points, mostly because of his 11-for-12 showing at the charity stripe.

“He was just a tremendous player,” Panzanaro said. “He was a great athlete, he had a good team. They had a big guy and a couple of others but when it came down to crunch time, the only one that was going to take a shot at crunch time was Fredette. We were playing three guys basically on him wherever he went and he still got shots off.”

Panzanaro admits, as great as Fredette was in high school, he never imagined he would become the player that he has in college.

“Absolutely not, I thought he was just a good high-school player that would have a little bit of success in college but I only saw him play a couple of times in high school,” Panzanaro said. “I heard a lot about him, everybody was speaking very highly of him before we played him. But he didn’t play that well against us and to be at the level he is at now, that’s a credit to him and a tribute to how hard he has worked to improve his game and bring it to that level of confidence.”

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