Panthers pound Marlboro, 63-44

By Mike Zummo
Posted 1/18/23

It had been a week since the Wallkill boys’ basketball team took the court.

They lost to Our Lady of Lourdes for their first Mid Hudson Athletic League defeat of the season. It was also …

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Panthers pound Marlboro, 63-44

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It had been a week since the Wallkill boys’ basketball team took the court.

They lost to Our Lady of Lourdes for their first Mid Hudson Athletic League defeat of the season. It was also their second straight loss after starting the season with six straight wins.

The Panthers got on the winning track on Friday night with a 63-44 win over the Marlboro Iron Dukes at Wallkill High School.

“It was big,” said Chris Baccaro, who led the Panthers with a game-high 28 points. “7-2 is a really good start to the season.”

The Panthers started the season with six straight victories before falling to the Monroe-Woodbury Crusaders in the championship game of the Glen McGinnis Tournament in Cornwall. They didn’t play again for nine days when they suffered their first divisional loss, 62-54, to the Our Lady of Lourdes Warriors.

Then, they had to sit for another week for the Iron Dukes to come to town, even if they got off to a slow start, taking a four-point lead after the first quarter. The Panthers outscored the Iron Dukes 20-8 in the second quarter to take command.

“I think just our energy (changed),” Wallkill coach Hunter Andrews said. “We talked about that all week. We haven’t played since last Friday, so a week off practice is always a little bit difficult to deal with. But these guys compete every night, so I just reminded them of that and all the work they put in every day at practice.”

Baccaro and Sean Perrin did most of the damage for the Panthers. Baccaro hit four 3-pointers on the way to his 28 points. He scored 12 of those points in the second quarter alone.

“My team has done a good job of just helping me get open, get my space and get creative,” Baccaro said. “They find me on backdoor cuts for the three. I give all the credit to those guys.”

Perrin followed with 17 points. They’ve been playing for up to six years together so they have a feel for each other’s tendencies. While Baccaro does most of his work from mid-range and behind the arc, Perrin gets the tough points inside. He only made goals, but he went 13 of 17 from the foul line.

“Chris shot the ball really well tonight,” Andrews said. “Sean was going to the basket, and got to the free-throw line by drawing contact, which is a huge piece to Sean’s game, and he’s really added to it this season.”

Chris DeNatale led the Iron Dukes with 17 points.

After playing four games in 18 days, the Panthers’ schedule will pick up starting this week with two games this week. They were scheduled to open the week on Tuesday with a road game against the Red Hook Raiders before coming home on Friday to host the Rondout Valley Ganders.

Next week, they’ll open with Section 9 Class A champion Goshen before heading to New Paltz to face the Division II-leading Huguenots.

“We’re never satisfied,” Andrews said. “We just want to get better each day and we want to compete with the best teams in Class A. I definitely think we can be one of them.”