Coming hard on the heels of a stunning overtime win over a TABC Storm JV by a 47-46 score on January 3, the JEC Thunder JV took on the SAR Sting at JEC on a crisp Monday night on January 8, before a full house of an estimated 300 fans. SAR and JEC were competing for the first round bye in the West Division, and the game had the feel of a playoff game.

SAR controlled the tap, but JEC drew first blood on the strength of a trey from PG David Rozezadeh (West Orange). SAR was not to be denied, and built up a 15-13 first quarter lead. But, ominous for JEC was that three starters, C Ethan Thurm (East Brunswick), SG Ben-Zion Kapustin (West Orange) and Rozezadeh all had to ride the pines with two early fouls each.

JEC’s bench was up to the task. Led by Fr. PG Dani Hess who netted a huge trey, Avi Elk, Eli Krul, and David Swissa, and PF Soph Yosef Sandler (Passaic—seven points in the half), JEC held on, and even tied the score at 24 each, going into halftime.

The Thunder figured that with three starters returning, they had the game in hand. But, SAR had other things in mind. The Sting buzzed to an 18-9 third quarter budge, and built a comfortable lead of 42-34 going into the fourth quarter. The Thunder, however, never stopped storming. Led by three clutch fourth quarter treys by Hillel Glick of West Orange, and a huge lift from Krul who also added a big trey, JEC won the final period 12-5 to send the game into overtime at 47 all.

In the first overtime period, both teams were tentative, and scored two points each, sending the game into double overtime at 49-49.From there, JEC took over. On the strength of stellar foul shooting by Thurm (3-4) and a drive by Rozezadah followed by a clutch foul shot, JEC outscored SAR 7-6, to win the game in a heart throbbing 47-46 win.

JEC was led by Glick with 15 points, Rosezadeh with 13, Sandler with 10, and Thurm with nine rebounds in limited time to go with his clutch foul shooting. For SAR, SG Shalom Hazan had 20 points, and Adin Rothstein tallied 16 pos.