by Alex Schwartz

Last night at the Izod Center, high school basketball in the state of New Jersey came to an end for this school year. The Non-Public B state champs, top seeded St. Patrick's, and the Group II state champs, third seeded Science Park, faced off in the NJSIAA Tournament of Champions title game. The Celtics of St. Pat's had been considered the TOC favorite since the start of the year and were looking to return to glory after falling short of even a state title in 2008, while the Chargers of Science were looking to win one more game than they did last year when they fell in the TOC finals to St. Anthony's. In a pretty filled Izod Center (only certain sections were available for seating), the two teams took the floor with their eyes on the crown and the right to say they were the best in the Garden State in 2008-2009.

When the Celtics jumped out to a 6-0 lead just 1:50 into the contest off buckets from their three biggest stars—Michael Gilchrist '11, North Carolina-signee Dexter Strickland '09, and Kyrie Irving '10—it looked as though the heavy favorite may well coast to their third TOC championship in three years and their fourth in seven years. The Chargers, who had to win a number of tough games just to get to this point, fought back to make it 14-11 with just under two minutes left in the first quarter, and at the end of the period it was 19-14 Celtics. Kyrie Irving scored 10 points in the first eight minutes, including two treys, his only threes of the game. Rameel Johnson '09 led Science in the first quarter—a sign of things to come—with seven points, shooting 5/6 at the stripe. The Celtics led by as much as 13 points in the second quarter, but took just an eight-point lead into the intermission, ahead by a score of 31-23, leaving Science very much in the game.

In the third quarter of play, things got quite interesting. Science slowly cut into the Celtics' lead, as Rameel Johnson singlehandedly outscored St. Pat's 6-2 through the first 1:39 of the half, making it 33-29. With the score 35-29 soon after, Science big man Ramon Johnson '11 hit a pair of free throws and then Kyrie Irving threw the ball away after a halfcourt trap. With the clock showing 5:49 and the Chargers' players and fans really getting into the game, Kevin Boyle took a full timeout to talk things over with his squad. Just 50 seconds later though, Amir Gilliam '10 hit a triple to make it a three-point affair, 37-34, the Celtics' smallest lead since 14-11 just over six minutes into the game. Science was playing just about as well as possible and was making St. Pat's sweat. Then, all of a sudden, something clicked for national powerhouse.  The team went on a 15-3 run to end the quarter, seemingly crushing any hopes the Chargers had of a come-from-behind victory. The quarter ended on a big-time dunk at the buzzer by Michael Gilchrist off a pass from Kevin Boyle, Jr. '10, putting an exclamation point on the Celtics' domination the last five minutes of the quarter and giving the team its biggest lead of the game. Despite playing great basketball for part of the quarter and cutting the lead down to three points, the Chargers trailed 52-37 entering the final eight minutes of play. Not only did the Chargers play fantastic to open the half, but they saw four Celtics get into major foul trouble, as Boyle picked up his third with 5:10, Irving getting his third with 3:12, George Mason-signee Paris Bennett '09 picking up his third with 2:15, and Derrick Gordon '11 being called for his fourth with 1:57 to go in the quarter.

Ten seconds into the fourth quarter, Dexter Strickland was called or his third foul and then 28 seconds later Kyrie Irving was called for his fourth personal foul. and it seemed like the only way the Chargers would be able to win would be by getting some of the Celtics to foul out, as Kevin Boyle has used just an eight-man rotation all year. Before Strickland picked up his fourth foul with 4:57 to go, he had two straight plays that drew roars from the crowd. With 6:10 to play, the future UNC Tar Heel caught an alley-oop dunk from Paris Bennett off a give-and-go on a two-on-one fast break. Soon after, Strickland threw down a slam all by himself on another fast break, making it 62-41. With 4:35 to play, Strickland was dribbling the ball and was being closely guarded and drove into his man near halfcourt. The whistle blew and an offensive foul was called, sending one of the best New Jersey high school guards this decade to the bench with his fifth foul in his final game. Strickland, a McDonald's All-American, received a round of applause as he left the floor and was hugged by his teammates. The Celtics led by as much as 24 points in the final quarter, and although six Celtics ended the game with at least three fouls, the deficit was too much for Science Park to overcome, despite the best efforts of Rameel Johnson, who scored 11 points in the fourth quarter and had over half of his team's points in the game. When the final horn sounded, ending the high school season in the Garden State, the St. Patrick's Celtics had a 73-57 victory, winning their fifth Tournament of Champions in school history, all but one of which have come in the last seven years. Rameel Johnson was named MVP for the runner-up Chargers, while Kyrie Irving was the honoree for the Celtics. Johnson took more free throws, hit more free throws, and shot a better percentage at the line than every other player on both teams combined. On this night, it just was not enough, as Gilchrist, Strickland, and Irving, considered by some to be the three best players in the state, scored just one less point than the entire Science team. Congratulations to both teams on a great season, and specifically to St. Patrick's on winning the Tournament of Champions.

BOX SCORE (statistics are unofficial)

Team                                1           2           H           3          4           F    
#1 St. Patrick's              19        12         31         21        21        73
#3 Science Park            14         9          23         14        20        57

St. Patrick's
Kyrie Irving- 26 points (10 in 1st quarter, 9 in 4th quarter), two 3P, 2/2 FT
Michael Gilchrist- 16 points (8 in 3rd quarter), 2/3 FT
Dexter Strickland- 14 points (10 in 2nd half)
Paris Bennett- 9 points (6 in 2nd half), 1/2 FT
Derrick Gordon- 4 points (all in 2nd quarter)
Dean Kowalski- 2 points
Kevin Boyle, Jr.- 2 points

Science Park
Rameel Johnson- 30 points (18 in 2nd half, with 11 in 4th quarter), 16/20 FT (8/10 in both halves)
Amir Gilliam- 10 points (all in 2nd half, with 7 in 4th quarter), two 3P, 2/2 FT
Kenneth Ortiz- 9 points, 3/5 FT
Ramon Johnson- 4 points, 2/2 FT
Aaron Cobb- 3 points, one 3P
Tevin Barber- 1 point, 1/2 FT

Note- photo is of Kyrie Irving and is from http://www.nj.com/