Bridgehampton Boys Basketball Suffers Its First League Loss to Rival Pierson, but Things Are Looking Up for Bees

The Bridgehampton boys basketball team lost its first League V game of the season at crosstown rival Pierson, 54-41, on Friday evening, but what it had accomplished before then, going undefeated through its first seven league games, should not be overlooked.

Killer Bees head coach Ron White had scheduled a number of nonleague games against larger, mostly Class A schools early on in the season, which led to a bit of a slow start for his team as it went 1-4 out of the gate. After its loss to East Islip in the Kendall Madison Tip-Off Classic at East Hampton though, Bridgehampton went 7-1, picking up big wins along the way against fellow Class D schools and its only loss again coming to a Class A school in Bayport-Blue Point.

Prior to Friday night’s loss in Sag Harbor, the Bees defeated Southold, 62-50, at home on January 10 and won, 79-38, on Shelter Island on January 3.

“All of this has been a learning experience for all of us, coach included,” White said on Tuesday morning. “We attempted to go play bigger schools ... we wanted to see where we stood. We took our bumps and bruises, watched film, and there are certain things that an opponent can do to make things more challenging, but sometimes things are more self inflicted, dealing with things like turnovers, missed shots, lack of execution. All those things we can control collectively, so we made a resolution to focus on the things that we could control. Like every other year, we’re undersized. Being undersized is not always a negative, so we’ll continue working on our transition game, sharing the ball and executing.”

Even in the loss to Pierson, Bridgehampton led, 13-8, after the first quarter and put a good scare into the much physically larger Whalers, and White very much appreciated the way his players came out and even said it could be a blueprint to how they play going forward.

“I think the first 10 minutes of that game is the style of game we can play. If we can put together four quarters of that, we might be able to do a little something this season,” he said. “I liked what I saw in that game. We proved we can play against guys much bigger than us and it’s just a function of making good plays and putting together stronger defensive styles.”

What White likes about his team offensively is that it hasn’t been too reliant on one person. Any of its six top players can lead the scoring on any given night. Case in point, Alex Davis and Sai’von Ward each scored 11 points against Pierson, but Jai Feaster led the way with 16 points in the win over Southold a few nights prior, and then at Shelter Island, four different Bees scored in double digits.

Defeating teams like Greenport and Smithtown Christian have certainly given the Killer Bees a big leg up when it comes to qualifying for the postseason. But both of those wins were decided by three points or less and White didn’t mince words — winning a county title will mean going through one of those teams.

“We expect everybody we already played to have gotten better,” White said. “They all have good coaches and they all want to win their class to hopefully continue to play in the postseason. We’ll continue to progress as well and we’ll see where it all shakes out come February 7.”

Bridgehampton hosted Port Jefferson on Wednesday and is expected to play at Ross this Friday at 4:30 p.m. before hosting a big game against Greenport this Tuesday, January 24, at 6 p.m. with Smithtown Christian to follow two nights later again at home at 6 p.m.