Chrisman Cardinals fall to La Salette Lions on Senior Night
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Linkon Snedeker helps coach Chrisman Senior Night’s Biddy Ball Game
In the final home game of the season for the Chrisman Cardinals, the birds hosted the La Salette Lions. The electricity of the final home game of the season, plus the anticipation of the Lions arriving filled the gym. Before the game, the Chrisman Cardinals Senior band members, cheerleaders and basketball players were honored before the hometown crowd.
As the Cards took the court for some warm-ups, the La Salette Lions entered, keeping their eyes on the players. The Chrisman pep band played. The crowd for La Salette was full of students from the private school, who made their presence known as the game began. From singing the school song to chanting the players’ names, the Lions cheering section wasn’t going to make concentrating easy for the Cardinals.
The Lion’s coach John Spezia had a unique take on coaching. Rather than yelling out the plays, a player who was on the bench, wrote the different plays for the team, relying on one of the players to be paying attention.
This could be considered another tactic for confusing the other team, leaving them unaware of what the play is if it’s not called out. The Cardinals don’t face the Lions multiple times in a season like most other teams, so figuring their mannerisms and other factors out in the four quarters of play makes it difficult.
The smallest player on the Lions team is at a height of 5’9, there’s quite a different between their players and Chrisman. Though their players are taller and are more physically built, they are able to move quick, which leads to opponents running themselves ragged, trying to keep up.
In the first quarter, La Salette’s Joe Martin landed nine points for the Lions, helping La Salette take a 21-7 lead over the Cardinals.
Martin seemed to have Chrisman’s Linkon Snedeker’s number as the two players went back and forth throughout the game. Martin appeared to be ‘talking’ to Snedeker as the two were set up for a rebound after foul shots. Snedeker did his best to ignore the trash talking, but it began to get under his skin. The frustration of Martin and the refs seeming to miss obvious calls led to Snedeker receiving a technical later in the game.
In the second quarter, Chrisman’s Karson Lewsader and Dyas Miller put up six for the Cardinals, but they continued to trail 26-13 going into halftime.
Coming out of the locker room, the Cardinals had a fire as they sank fifteen points, thanks to Karson Lewsader, Triston Lehmkuhl, Dyas Miller and Connor Taylor. La Salette continued to lead 43-28.
In the fourth, it looked like the Cardinals may come back for the victory.
With a mixture of refs missing calls and the Chrisman crowd’s emotions being heard, the gym became more intense. At the buzzer, Chrisman fell to La Salette with a final score of 64-49.
For La Salette, Joe Martin led with twenty-seven points, followed by Steven Diester with eleven. Charles Prather and Eamon Martin finished the game with six points each.
Joe De’Arrtola had five points, followed by Derwin Wilson with four. Augustine Blood finished with three points and Jesus Omar Ortiz had two points.
For Chrisman, Karson Lewsader led with twenty-three points, followed by Connor Taylor with nine points. Dyas Miller ended the game with eight points, followed by Triston Lehmkuhl with six and Marion Cronkhite with three.