Basketball Teams Finishing Strong, Wrestler Wins Accolade

A few Ridgewood teams move closer to the playoffs with the hockey and wrestling teams got their golden tickets to the playoffs while the basketball teams rebounded with strong weeks.

Brandon Giovanetti was named Most Outstanding Wrestler while the Ridgewood boys team moved into the semi-finals of the Bergen Invitational Tournament and the ice hockey clinched the Big North Gold regular season championship.

Wrestling

Giovanetti pinned Glen Rock/Saddle Brook's Matt Jacobson in overtime of the 130-pound final match at District 6 in Fair Lawn. Giovanetti was one of five Maroons to qualify for the regions that start on Tuesday at Hackensack High School.

The only other district title holder was Joe Oliva at 112 pounds. Oliver defeated Paramus Catholic's Eric Hicks, 9-4 in the championship game.

Three Maroons grabbed third place in their weight classes and received a ticket to the regions. The top three wrestlers in the district qualify for the regionals.

Will Montgomery (119), Justin Gramaglia (135) and Kyle Gibson (160) grabbed third place finishes. Will Montgomery came in third at 119 after defeating Hawthorne's Rich Garzon 5-3 in the third place match. Justin Gramaglia pinned Hawthorne's Murad Stas at 5:42 in the 135 consolation battle while Kyle Gibson pinned Teaneck's Rafael Rivas at 51 seconds at 160.

At regionals, the top three wrestlers in each weight class earn a ticket to the state finals in Atlantic City.

Boys Basketball

Ridgewood boys basketball team came from behind to beat Westwood, 51-48, in the Bergen Invitational Tournament on Saturday at St. Joseph's of Montvale.

The Maroons take on Dwight Morrow in the BIT semi-finals on Friday at 7 p.m. on their home court at Ridgewood.

Junior Evan Bartlik led the way for Ridgewood with 19 points while Albin Hoh and Nick Simon added 13 and 11 points respectively.

Ridgewood boys head coach Mike Troy liked how his team won despite not playing their best game. "I give Westwood a lot of credit because they played a lot harder for 32 minutes," said Troy. "I'm happy that we had to fight to come back."

While the boys basketball team was highlighted by the win over Westwood to raise its record to 12-11, the team also picked up a couple of victories during the week. Ridgewood also squeaked by Demarest, 61-57, on Tuesday. Bartlik again led the Maroons, this time with 25 points.

In addition Ridgewood dropped Bergen Tech, 83-47, on Thursday. Four Maroons scored in double figures led by Bartlik with 20. Hoh, Ryan Scholfield and Simon added 16, 13 and 11 points respectively.

In the victory over Westwood, the Ridgewood boys were down by a dozen points in the second half, but came back behind the shooting of Cohen, Simon and Bartlik to catch up to the Cardinals.

After falling behind 37-25, Ridgewood was able to pick away at the Westwood lead. While in foul trouble for most of the third quarter, Bartlik came off the bench and hit a three-point shot just before the buzzer to make it a three-point game at 39-36 heading into the fourth quarter.

Westwood would stay one step ahead of the Maroons in the early going but Cohen stepped up his game, scoring all 8 of his points in the final 90 seconds of the game. He hit a shot to tie the game with just 1:25 to go and floored Westwood on the next posession, silking a shot to give the Maroons a 47-45 lead.

But then Cohen would get going and scored all eight of his points in the final 90 seconds of the game.

Girls Basketball

Don't think the boys stole the show this week –the girls basketball team also had as much success. The Lady Maroons defeated both opponents last week.

The Lady Maroons beat Demarest, 52-32, and Bergen Tech, 75-36, on Tuesday and Thursday respectively as Ridgewood girls team improved to 12-9 on the season.

In the victory over Bergen Tech, Ridgewood had a big second quarter as they outscored Tech, 30-5. The Lady Maroons led 44-17 heading into the third quarter.

Eight Ridgewood players scored in the game led by Kelci Smesko and Courtney Tarleton with 18 and 16 points respectively.

On Tuesday the Lady Maroons also had the game in hand as Ridgewood led Demarest 32-11 at halftime. Meghan Roxas and Smesko led the Lady Maroons with 14 and 13 points respectively against the Norsewomen.

Hockey

The Ridgewood ice hockey team ended the week on a sour note with a 3-2 loss at Pascack Valley on Friday.

But the Maroons skaters clinched the Big North Gold regular season title as they tied Tenafly, 1-1, on Tuesday at McKay Park. The Big North Gold Cup starts this week with Ridgewood as the top seed.

Down 1-0, Corey Morgan potted the game-tying goal with less than three minutes left in the game. The Tigers could not respond and Ridgewood would grab the Big North Gold title. As of last week the Maroons were 15-3-3 and 12-1-3 in the league.

In the loss to Pascack Valley, the Maroons received goals from Peter McGinley and Nick Tucci against the Indians.