Sports Wrap
By William Hathaway, Jr.
The National Football League season has finished for now, and a familiar champion has been crowned world champions.
Despite trailing for quite a while, the Kansas City Chiefs bounced back to earn their second title win in four years. Quarterback Patrick Mahomes fought through an ankle injury and passed for three touchdowns to take home MVP honors for the winning Chiefs team, who won Super Bowl LVII in Glendale, Arizona 38-35 over the Philadelphia Eagles.
At halftime, KC was down by 10. It could have been much worse, but on a key and SB record tying 17 play drive, the Eagles had to settle for a field goal. While Philly QB Jalen Hurts had a SB record three rushing touchdowns at his position, he was not playing the other side of the ball, and despite the Eagles vaunted defense, they failed to get any pressure on Mahomes.
Late in the game, Mahomes connected with former NY Giant Kadarius Toney on one of his TD passes. Toney later set a record with the longest punt return ever recorded in the big game.
In clutch time, Hurts scored the game tying TD and two-point conversion to square the game at 35-35. However, Kansas City got the ball back, and after a controversial pass interference call, kicker Harrison Butker came on to kick the game winning field goal with less than 10 second left to set the final score at 38-35.
As football took center stage, there was also plenty of basketball. The men’s basketball team at Seton Hall defeated DePaul at the Prudential Center 69-64. Tyrese Samuels was among the leaders with 14 points and 7 rebounds, KC Ndefo had 13 points and 6 rebounds, Kadary Richmond had 14 points and 6 rebounds, and Al-Amir Dawes added 12 points. Leading DePaul was Umoja Gibson with 21 points and 6 rebounds. On Feb. 8th at home, SHU had a different result against Creighton, losing 75-62. Dawes had 19 points while Richmond had 10 points in the loss.
Last week, the Seton Hall took some tough losses at home, but won a huge game against DePaul 89-82. Senior Lauren Park Lane broke the Pirates single game scoring record with 39 points, on 11-19 shooting from the floor and 2-4 from three point range. Park Lane broke the record late in the game, which was once held by former SHU star Tabatha Richardson-Smith. Teammate Sidney Cooks lit it up too with 29 points.
Seton Hall as a team was 32-60 for 53 percent from the floor. The Pirates improved to 16-10 overall and 9-7 in the Big East Conference.
In local high school basketball, the annual Essex County Tournament semifinals took place at West Orange High School. The 20-5 University High girls’ team is heading to another ECT final, after burning West Orange 51-33. Paradise Fisher led the UHS Lady Phoenix with 16 points, 8 rebounds and 5 assists. Mya Davis added 10 points in the game. West Orange finished 14-11 on the season.
On the boys’ side, Seton Hall Prep punched their ticket to the finals after beating Montclair Immaculate 51-45. Leading Prep was Ethan Maynard with 17 points and Darrius Phillips grabbed 13 rebounds. The Pirates are 18-4 on the season and will face Arts High for the title. The Jaguars beat Columbia High 38-30 in their semifinal.
