Colon, Hess lead NL by Salisbury

Defense. Balance. Composure.

The Northern Lehigh boys basketball team flashed all of those winning qualities on Thursday night.

Gio Colon and Brandon Hess combined for 37 points, as Northern Lehigh was impressive during a 59-46 Colonial League victory against Salisbury.

“It’s huge,” said Northern Lehigh head coach Jeff Miller of the win. “It’s early, obviously, and it’s a long season ahead.

“But we’re still relatively young. For them to experience this tonight — a good atmosphere against a very good Salisbury team is great.”

Defense.

The Falcons are led by 1,000-point scoring senior Jack Reichenbach. But Miller and his team had a plan to defend him, and it was well executed.

The Bulldogs packed the paint, held Reichenbach to just six first-half points and, as a result, carried an 11-point lead into intermission.

“If he was going to score, we wanted him to score from the three-point line,” Miller said. “We figured if he gets it inside, he’s going to score, and we’re going to get in foul trouble. We wanted to limit his looks inside. He still got more than I’d like, but he is a heck of a ballplayer.” Reichenbach did go on a tear in the second half, scoring 17 of his game-high 23 across the final two periods. He scored 15 of his team’s 18 points in the third, but Northern Lehigh kept pace.

The NL zone forced the Falcons to have extremely long possessions, with a ton of perimeter-only passing, settling for outside shots.

“We wanted to load the paint on him and force his teammates to knock down shots,” Hess said. “I think the gameplan worked out really well. It’s a big win, it shows the league we’re for real.”

Balance.

Hess and Colon enjoyed fine offensive games, but a handful of other Bulldogs showed they are capable of doing damage at a moment’s notice.

When Hess and Colon combined for only seven points in the second period, Nate Keller contributed all seven of his points in the quarter to help keep pace with the Falcons.

“We could have a different leading scorer every night and none of these kids will care,” Miller said. “They want to come out, play well, hopefully get a win, and have a good time. It’s the most fun team that I’ve had the pleasure to coach.”

Composure.

The Bulldogs had long offensive possessions in the fourth quarter, milking the clock with the lead, and forcing Salisbury to foul or make mistakes. In the final three minutes, the Bulldogs shot 11 foul shots and converted eight of them to seal the deal.

“We’ve been up before and we’ve had plenty of times where we’ve blown leads,” Colon said. “But this time, we kept it composed and we knew what we had to do.”

RUN THE SHOW ... Preston Kemery tallied six points, but his impact was much greater on the court for the ‘Dogs. The primary ballhandler for the Bulldogs made sure his team made the correct decisions, while displaying his vision and dishing out some impressive assists.

NOT MUCH HELP ... Reichenbach scored half of his team’s points. No other Falcon finished with more than six.

SALISBURY

Stewart 3-0-0-6, Foster 3-0-0-6, Kulp 2-0-0-6, Sylvester 0-0-0-0, Foley 1-0-0-3, Reichenbach 9-2-3-23, Blackledge 0-0-0-0, Snyder 0-2-2-2. TOTAL: 18-4-5-46.

NORTHERN LEHIGH

Kemery 2-2-2-6, Colon 6-5-6-19, Seier 0-3-4-3, Seiler 0-2-4-2, Keller 3-0-1-7, Hess 7-2-2-18, Schoff 0-3-4-3. TOTAL: 19-16-19-59.

Salisbury 6 11 18 11 - 46

No. Lehigh 13 15 15 16 - 59

Three-pointers: SAL - Reichenbach 3, Kulp 2, Foley 1; NL - Colon 2, Hess 2, Keller 1.