St Sebastians School - Arrow Yearbook (Newton, MA)

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fs While Basketball normally waits until December to lay claim to the athletic spot- light, the installation of the beautiful new wooden floor in the cage during the summer did much to make the student body Basketball conscious from the opening day of School. Even before the Hrst Football game was played, the devotees of the hoop game were asking permission to work out on the court and their joy knew no bounds as they noted the improvement that the new surface made in their dribbling and foot- work. On the fifteenth of November, formal practice was announced and the Varsity candidates were happy to welcome back Bob Hogarty as mentor, while the j.V.'s looked forward to an enjoyable season under Father Keating's tutelage. As he surveyed his prospects, the Varsity coach was pleased to see that Graduation had taken only four of his previous year's squad, Hugh Bradshaw, Charlie Hearn, Andy McAuliffe and Tom Hartnett. That meant that he could capitalize on the experience gleamed in the past campaign by Captain Frank Kett, Hilt Collupy, Bob Kelly, Bill Brooks and Bill Carey. ln addition, he was fortunate to have ample reserve strength in joe Shea, Ralph Donnelly, jack Cochran, Dick Collupy, Fran Downey and jim Canning. Among the newcomers, Ed Collupy, john Murphy and Paul Burke showed the greatest promise. When the 1948-49 schedule was posted, the basketeers were delighted to find that it included the top-notch private school quintets and a seasoning of parochial and public school competition. To open the season, St. Sebastian's was invited to the Boston Garden on December 7th to lace the South Kingstown, R.I., team that had defeated us on the same court for the past two years. This time it was a different story, however, for, after Kel sunk the hrst basket of the year Bill Carey and Hilt Collupy netted two consecutive goals apiece that put us out in front by a comfortable margin. When Frank Kett tapped in one of Fish's rebounds, the Rhode Island lads called for a time out to revise their strategy, but it had little avail because, by the end of the first period, we led 18-6 and, by half time, we had pulled away to 31-10. In the second half, our pace slackened a bit because of frequent substitutions, yet we con- tinued to roll up points on the strength of Bill Brooks' sharpshooting that gave him 10 tallies on Kel's wizardry that accounted for 6 more. The final reading on the elec- tric scoreboard was St. Sebastian's 49, South Kingstown 30, a result most gratifying to the St. Sebastian student body which attended as a unit. When the box score appeared in the next days papers, we were pleasantly surprised to note that we had had three big guns in our offensive: Bill Brooks with 16, Hilt Collupy with 13 and Bob Kelly with 12, Although these efforts would have been enough to outpoint the out-of-staters, Bill Carey's 6 and Frank Kett's 2 came early in the game and helped to discourage the opposition. The first contest played on our new floor was with Walpole High, a team that had pressed us to the limit to beat them by one point the year before. With our j.V.'s setting the Varsity a good example by winning their preliminary game, 38-14, the Arrows proceeded to break the game wide open in the hrst period and then went on to win by an identical score. Although Hilt Collupy and Bill Carey were on the side- 141451-

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lines, Bill Brooks and Bob Kelly set a hot pace in the first quarter, scoring three baskets apiece, while Jim Canning and lid Collupy teamed with Fran Kett to turn in a nice piece of defensive play that held Walpole to five points. After the initial period, the issue was never in doubt, but Kel continued to amaze the gallery with a performance that yielded him 17 points for the day. To add to our attack, Ed Collupy poured in three consecutive goals in the third quarter and that set the stage for the appearance of our second team and this unit played for most of the remainder of the game. The highlight of their showing came in the final period when Fran Downey threw in a sparkling hook shot to earn his first Varsity points and bring down the house, Besides Ke1's 17, Ed Collupy's 8 and Bill Brooks' 6, the scoring column recorded single baskets by Kett, Canning and Downey together with a successful free try by joe Shea, Although the season was still in its infancy, our next game produced the most spine-tingling thrill of the campaign when we came from behind to put on a sensa- tional ending and defeat St. Patrick's of Watertown, 39-38. Led by the record-mak- ing Dave Nangle, highest schoolboy scorer in the state, the visiting quintet lost no time in establishing a 10-3 advantage over the Red and Black. At that point, however, Brooksie caught fire and racked up three successive goals and a free try to put us back in the running. Despite this endeavor, St. Patrick's rallied on their part to the extent that they were able to leave the floor at half-time with a 14-11 edge. Whatever the change in tactics was that Bob Hogarty called for between the halves, it certainly worked wonders. Roaring back to the fray in the third period, the Arrows immediately regained the lead when Bill Brooks continued his stellar exhibition with five goals in that stanza while Bob Kelly broke the spirit of the invaders by swishing in two beautiful set shots from 20 feet out. Not to be outdone, Nangle 8: Co. kept pitching as best they could, with the result that the end of the third chapter found them behind by a mere two points, To erase that deficit was only the work of a minute and, although Brooksie put us out front with another lay-up, in no time the tables were turned so that we trailed, 33-30. Successful free tries by Ed Collupy and Fran Kett then put us on equal footing at 33 all, only to have Watertown draw away 37-33 in the waning minutes of the game. Awarded two foul shots, joe Shea came through on both of them, just before Dave Nangle added a singleton that made the score, 38-35. In the midst of the general gloom pervading the cage, Bill Carey pushed up a goal as the minute hand of the clock started its final journey and, after the St, Pat's offensive had been repulsed, Brooksie broke through their close pressing defensive cordon to scoop in a lay-up while in mid-air and regain us a 39-38 margin. There was time then only for a work- ing of the ball to half court by the visitors before the final gong sounded to allow our players and spectators to break the tension with whoops of glee. As events turned out, it was the only defeat administered to the Watertown team over the entire season and Bill Brooks' 22 points won him the role of chief giant killer. Fairly well scattered, the rest of our tallies were divided among Bob Kelly UQ, Frank Kett Oy, Bill Carey and joe Shea Q2 apiecej , and Ed Collupy Q1 Q. To the delight of our loyal fans, the next game was easier on the nerves for we did not have too much trouble in disposing of Monsignor Coyle High School on our own court to the tune of 45-30. Once again, a heavy barrage of points in the first period sewed up the contest and we were never headed after Kel hit the target on the tap-off play. With a 28-13 advantage at half time, Bob Hogarty let the second team see plenty of .ervice and Dick Collupy proceeded to put on his best performance of the year by steal- ing a dribble at mid-court and going all the way to register a lay-up. Later on, two con- versions raised his point total to 4 and earned him the King's Chair at dinner that eve- ning, With no pressure on them, Kel, Brooksie, Fish and Bill Carey came up with 13, 11, 9 and 6 respectively, while Minnow's 4 and Kett's 2 closed out the Coyle account. A Sunday afternoon schoolboy program at the Arena brought us into competition with Henry Barry's Sacred Heart of Newton team and we were not extended too much -1 147 1 .