basketball

 Batavia graduate Adam Brasky and his King's College basketball team improved to 2-0 this past week with a huge upset victory.

King's shocked two-time defending MAC Commonwealth Conference champion Widener 80-67 in the championship game of the Ramada Inn Classic on Sunday.

Brasky had a key 3-pointer in the contest and finished the game with seven points, according to a story on D3hoops.com.

In the first half the teams went back and forth as the teams were tied 26-26 with 6:14 remaining on the clock. King’s would use back-to-back three-pointers by Mike Wagner to build a 32-26 advantage with 3:44 left. After Widener countered with a three-pointer by B.J. Smith, Adam Brasky answered for King’s with a trey of his own to give the Monarchs with a 35-29 advantage with 3:03 left.

Widener was ranked seventh in the Division III small school poll and 23rd in the nation.

The Genesee Region League has some quality basketball, but typically stuggles in the sectional playoffs (with the exception of Notre Dame in Class D).

There is proof of that when you look at the results from last season, when Elba was the only team to make the finals where they lost to Fillmore 53-43.

Batavia also made the finals in Class A, playing in the Monroe County League during the season.

As teams have started practice this week, we are looking at a season in which the GR has the potential to make some noise down the road.

Oakfield-Alabama and Pembroke are expected to be two of the favorites, but are going to have some tough teams to battle in the larger of the C classes, including East Rochester, Gananda, Avon and Cal-Mum.

Alexander and Kendall are improved programs that are going to look to surprise people during the regular season, but have to deal with Perry and Lyons (which is usually stronger in basketball than football) in the lower C bracket.

Elba and Notre Dame have a very memorable game in Class DD last year and are amongst the favorites again this year. But Genesee Valley and Arkport have had solid teams in the past.

There is obviously a long way to go and this should be a great year for GR boys hoops, but it is interesting to see how the classifications break down and imagine the league bringing home a couple of championships.

Notre Dame boys basketball coach Mike Rapone and Prattsburgh coach Jim Burke have had some great battles over the years. Burke won a regular season contest between the two squads last season, making Rapone wait another game before getting his 500th career victory as a boys basketball coach.

Rapone beat Burke to the 500-win plateau as Burke is still sitting at 499 career victories heading into this season. But Burke beat Rapone to the Section 5 Hall of Fame and will be inducted on Saturday at the Clarion Riverside Hotel in Rochester.

Burke's daughter, Jamie, will also be inducted at the ceremony as well as NBA coach Jeff Van Gundy, who is a Brockport native.

Here is the description given on Burke at the Section 5 Web site.

.. This coaching icon has been a model of success in both boy’s and girl’s basketball. Jim has amassed 676 wins (499 boys, 177 girls) and has directed Prattsbugh Central to 6 Boys and 4 Girls Section V titles. His 1991 Boys team netted the NY State championship with an unblemished 29-0 record. He was honored by the Rochester D&C in 1991 as their AGR “Coach of the Year.” Coach Burke is also a member of the New York State Basketball Coaches and Wayland-Cohocton Halls of Fame.

 The fall season has been coming to a close in recent weeks, and many of our local teams did very well. Le Roy footbal is, of course, still going and will be playing in the Far West Regionals on Saturday.

Starting next week, we will be featuring previews of some area squads and am hoping to give tons of quality, in-depth coverage of our winter teams.

The first thing I want to post in is the preseason state wrestling rankings. Thanks to a tip (please feel free to email me at brian (at) thebatavian (dot) com), I see that we have some local wrestlers that are ranked high in the state in the preseason poll.

Warsaw's Ian Paddock is the top-ranked wrestler at 130 pounds and teammate Zac Griffith is third at 171 pounds.

Holley's Quenton Murphy is second-ranked at 112 pounds and Letchworth's Mike Nevinger is top-ranked at 140.

Batavia's Ryan Darch is the No. 5 seeded grappler at 160 pounds.

We are always looking for tips, story ideas and blog contributions. Please send me an email any time, or register and share stories of what happens with your teams during the season.

While starting to prepare myself for the basketball season, I stumbled upon a pretty cool post on  www.familyoldphotos.com featuring this photo of the 1925-1926 boys basketball team at Batavia High School.

The lettermen on the team were captain John Luther, Klein McCurdy, Albert Morehouse, Elbert Martin, Roy Wickens, Donald Sutherland and manager Charles Hodgson. There are also three unnamed players in the photo.

I looked around and tried to find a record, but statistics from those days don't tend to make it to the Internet.

It would be cool get get more information on this team, if anybody knows that history.

Batavia product Missy Thurston is looking to help the Keuka women's basketball team this season as a returning player for the Storm.

Thurston was a star point guard for the Blue Devils and is entering her junior season with Keuka.

She scored 5.9 points per game last season and led the team with 66 steals, while dishing out 33 assists.

Here is a full preview of the Kueka women's basketball team, which went 14-10 last season.

Tim Sullivan was an unlikely Division I basketball player when he graduated from Notre Dame High School back in 1978.

He lacked the size and didn't put up numbers in high school that would make big schools look at an undersized player from Genesee County.

But he did just that, walking on to the Canisius basketball team and playing at that high level. He also played for the Syracuse Shooting Stars and spent a few weeks on the roster of the Buffalo Rapids of the ABA, just a few years back.

I have gotten to know Sullivan over the years as he has helped many area youngsters with the game of basketball and we had a chance to catch up Tuesday afternoon.

It turns out, things are going quite well for the shooting expert.

He recently won a 3-point shooting competition  - at the still Hooping 3-on-3 3-point shooting contest - against some pretty hefty competition, namely former NBA stars Glen Rice, Hersey Hawkins and Dale Ellis. He won the contest two years ago and was second last year.

Sullivan is continuing to work as an instructor at camps all across the country.

He puts on about 250 clinics per year and works for ADIDAS Phenom camp in San Diego, California.

Sullivan does one-on-one work with individual D-1 prospects and helps with instruction at many colleges, including Syracuse University, Indiana University and the University of Kentucky.

Sullivan said he has studied the science of shooting and has figured out how anybody can be a 3-point shooting star. Check out this video I found on YouTube, where he does not miss an attempt in almost 3 minutes.

You can also check out his Web site for more information.