St. Marks 46-63

St Marks School of Texas defeated Yavneh 63-46 Saturday night. The loss drops the Bulldogs record to 10-3.

Yavneh had not lost in their home state this season. They returned home from Memphis and built a nine game winning streak by forcing opponents to play their style, giving those same opponents no choice but to just hand them the ball and fuel the Bulldog attack, and straight out-hustling team after team. Those teams finally could not take any more and gave way to the physical and mental exhaustion being imposed on them. Saturday night, St Marks used that same formula to turn a game that could have gone either way into a decisive streak breaking nightmare for the Yavneh Bulldogs. St Marks spent the first couple of minutes showing off their ball handling and ability to run the three man weave. After a surprisingly uneventful start, the Bulldogs made two nice passing plays to take a 4-2 lead. Similar to the TJ game, both teams were turning the ball over with alarming frequency. Adam Karnett was on both sides of the ledger in that respect to shape the first period of play. While he did his share of post-Thanksgiving charity work, he also had two electric steals for layups and Yavneh held a 13-11 through one quarter of play. Both teams feasted on the turnovers and there was very little of any half-court offense on display. A combined 22 turnovers provided for almost all the scoring on both sides, and it was clear that whoever could execute when the dust settled would be in control. After feeling as if the lead should be much greater than 2 points, the Bulldogs yielded a 5-0 run to start the second period. Suddenly, the lead belonged to St Marks and they would hold that lead for the rest of the night. Yavneh continued to turn the ball over time and again as St Marks continued to separate. They seemed confused and flustered for the first time in over a month. Nothing was going right in the half-court and the transition opportunities were becoming fewer and fewer. The lead may have reached double digits in the first half if not for some major St Marks foul trouble. The Bulldogs were shooting the penalty for literally the entire second period. As it was, the margin stood at 26-17 for halftime. Shooting was only a 4% differential but Yavneh’s 17 turnovers were enough to explain the entire mess. It was extremely unclear if St Marks needed the errors or had any other plan of attack. A nice response out of the locker room was capped by a Karnett to Josh Lynn three pointer to trim the lead to 26-22. The 5-0 run, however, was answered by a three point breakout from St Marks for the game’s first double-digit lead. With 5:08 to play in the third period, the Bulldogs had a great chance to swing the momentum back in their direction. A 32-22 game easily could have been more than cut in half on a key sequence in which Karnett scored with contact. In addition to the three-point play opportunity, a technical foul was called on the St Marks bench. Free throws and the extra possession could have chopped the lead down to 2 or 3 but remained at 32-25 with pretty close to none of the above. Meanwhile, St Marks was offensive rebounding Yavneh into submission. 10 extra chances in the third period alone wore on the home team, and combined with the turnovers, just was too much to overcome. Karnett delivered a half-court bomb at the third quarter buzzer but even with that the deficit stood at 45-30. The 7-0 run for Yavneh bridging the third and fourth periods was essentially the stand of the night. Adam Schor tipped in a free throw miss followed by an Ori Guttman steal which drew an intentional foul call. The game got as close at 45-34 after that but an immediate 7-0 St Marks three-point led response put the game out of reach with 6:12 to go. Down the stretch, the Bulldogs had several opportunities to score. Nifty passing set up several point-blank chances that just were not converted. Karnett led the charge with 12 points and 6 steals but it was simply not enough. The Guttman brothers put up a pair of 10s, Ori with 10 points and Itai with 10 rebounds. Sam Kleinman also put up 7 points and 4 assists. In the end, 25 turnovers and 19 offensive rebounds allowed were enough to sink the ship on this night.

Yavneh (10-3) will look to rebound and start a new streak in their first road game in almost three weeks. Southwest Christian of Fort Worth will be the opponent with the two teams never before having faced off.

The Kennel Report, now in its ninth season, is written by…

Zack Pollack M&M

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