Smith and Dornisch power Holy Cross
Each had a hot half to lead the Lancers over West Deptford, 37-30.
Lloyd Smith was hot in the first half.
Justin Dornisch was hot in the second.
The two juniors took turns in the lead role as Holy Cross scored a 37-30 victory over West Deptford Saturday in a nonleague boys' basketball game.
Smith, a 6-foot-2 forward, scored 11 of his 13 points in the first half. Dornisch, a 5-10 guard, scored all 12 of his points in the second half for the Lancers (2-0).
"We're a young team and we're going to have some ups and downs," said Smith, who also collected seven rebounds. "We're going to keep getting better and better during the season."
Freshman guard Justin Hansen came off the bench to score 13 and junior forward Tom Jakubowski added 10, including six in a fourth-quarter rally, for West Deptford (0-2).
"Everybody played hard," West Deptford coach John Clark said. "That was a game that could have gone either way. That's a good team and we came in here and held them to 37 points."
Free-throw shooting hurt both teams in a physical game in the Lancers' gymnasium. Holy Cross was 8 for 19 from the foul line while West Deptford was 5 for 16.
West Deptford was down, 33-17, early in the fourth quarter, but the Eagles ran off 12 straight points to close within 33-29 with a little more than a minute to play.
Junior forward Jalen Burks made four free throws in the final minute to preserve the lead for the Lancers.
"When we ran our offense we went out to a big lead," Holy Cross coach Barry Harper said. "Then we got sloppy. We had done a lot of good things in preseason and in the opener [a 58-32 victory over Delran on Friday night], but we made a lot of mistakes in this game.
"Give West Deptford credit. Maybe they took us out of our game. But we're going to have a hard practice on Monday."
With five juniors in the starting lineup, the Lancers are looking to improve during the course of the season.
"We've been playing together since freshman year," Dornisch said. "We've got a lot of unity."
West Deptford 4 7 6 13 - 30
Holy Cross 8 7 13 9 - 37
WD: Jordan Haines 1, Tom Jakubowski 10, Kyle Redrow 2, Tim Fair 4, Justin Hansen 13.
HC: John Adryan 1, Jalen Burks 4, Justin Dornisch 12, Shamus Keegan 5, Steve Noworyta 2, Lloyd Smith 13.