Sports

Boys Basketball: Porters take season-ending game, 81-20

The Greenport boys basketball team didn’t grab a league championship when it defeated Shelter Island last week but it did earn a new individual record for the most 3-point field goals in a game.

Greenport’s bid for a share of the Suffolk County League VIII title last Wednesday night, February 15, became an afterthought, thanks to a phenomenal shooting display by Gavin Dibble. The Greenport sophomore guard knocked down one 3-point shot after another with astounding accuracy. A school record that had stood for 23 years finally fell.

Dibble stroked a Greenport record of 10 3-pointers and rang up a career-high 39 points as the Porters whipped the visiting Indians by 51 points, 81-30, on the final night of the regular season.

“It’s really the best feeling that I ever had,” Dibble said. “It’s the best game I ever played in my life.”

Dibble had five 3-pointers and 19 points by halftime but his work was not nearly completed. By the time it was all over, he had played the game of his young life, shooting a sizzling 14 of 17 from the field. He also had 7 assists, 7 rebounds and 4 steals.

“Amazing,” Greenport guard Sean Charters said. “He was on fire. … He missed, what, three shots? That’s incredible. You have no clue as a defender what to do when a guy is just not missing anything like that.”

When the game ended, Gavin Dibble raised a fist in the air and was hugged by teammates. Fans congratulated him, and a teammate asked him to sign one of his sneakers.

Following the euphoria, though, there was disappointment for the Porters. In order to clinch a tie for the league title along with the Stony Brook School (11-7, 11-3), Greenport needed Stony Brook to lose to Bridgehampton last Wednesday night. The result of that game was not known before Edwards and his players left the gym.

Later, their hearts must have sank when the final score flashed across the TV screen: Stony Brook 50, Bridgehampton 34.

A 4-point loss to Shelter Island last month ended up costing Greenport a league crown, but the Porters enjoyed some payback last Wednesday.

“We wanted to prove a point tonight that we shouldn’t have lost that night,” said Charters.

A volunteer assistant, Jim Colligan, coached Shelter Island (4-13, 3-11) in the absence of its coach, Michael Mundy, who was out with cellulitis. Colligan couldn’t have liked what he saw from start to finish. Gavin Dibble scored 7 points in the first quarter as the Porters jumped out to a 12-point lead. The lead grew and grew. It was 42-8 after a foul shot by Jimmy Read with 1 minute 32 seconds left in the second quarter. Nineteen seconds later, the Indians finally reached double figures on a pair of free throws by Nathan Mundy.

Matt BeltCappellino was Shelter Island’s leading scorer with 10 points.

Some tough defense by Greenport held Shelter Island to 20.5 percent field-goal shooting.

It will be remembered as the night that Gavin Dibble shot the lights out and entered his name in the Greenport record book.

“When you can shoot like that,” he said, “it’s just the best feeling in the world.”