By Tom Nader

Publisher and Editor

It may have been Senior Night for the Field boys basketball team on Friday, but it was a senior from Streetsboro who was also prepared for a special night.

The Rockets’ Ryan Roscoe returned to the court after missing the last month of the season with a left ankle injury and helped spark his Rockets with a momentum-shifting fourth quarter offensive burst that led to a 50-38 Metro Athletic Conference victory.

Roscoe scored seven of his 10 points in the fourth quarter to ignite a 22-3 run in the final 8 minutes of play.

The offensive jolt turned a narrow 28-25 Rockets lead after three quarters into a comfortable margin.

And came at a time when the game was begging for either team to create some sort of mini-run that could change the path of a game that had turned rugged for both teams.

“We were definitely waiting for a run to happen for us,” Streetsboro head coach Nick Marcini said.

Part of the shift, though, actually came from Marcini being tired of waiting.

The veteran coach called an early fourth-quarter timeout, and with some discussion with his staff, decided to move away from the team’s zone-specific offense and began to run an offense  that was installed earlier in the year designed to attack man defense.

“Our spacing and attempts to be effective in the high post simply were not working,” Marcini said of attacking the Falcons’ zone defense. “We decided to create more space, dive cut and see if (Field) would extend out to us.”

The strategy worked.

The Rockets’ offense, which had failed to find any consistent rhythm through the first three quarters, suddenly was finding pockets of space and lanes to attack.

The result was nearly as many points in the fourth quarter (22) as the Rockets had scored the previous three combined (28).

Marcini admitted that not until Friday had they needed to consider making the offensive switch.

“That was the first time we have done that this year,” Marcini said. “Field’s zone is the one zone that has given us problems. It gave us problems when we played them the first time this season,” said Marcini, referencing his team’s 51-50 loss at home on Dec. 19.

On the other side of the ball, the Rockets’ defense suffocated the Falcons in the final quarter and held them to a mere three points, connecting on only one of the team’s eight field-goal attempts. For the game, the Falcons (5-14, 4-9 MAC) shot 10-of-38, with more than half of their attempts coming from 3-point range (4-of-21).

Streetsboro (10-8, 8-5 MAC), which has now won seven of its last nine games, did not shoot tremendously better at only 16-of-51, but did get to the line 17 times and made 13.

Initially, it did not seem that the Rockets would struggle to find points. They jumped out to a quick 9-0 lead highlighted by a pair of 3-pointers from PJ Robinson. Streetsboro led 14-5 after the first quarter, but Field battled and won the second quarter 11-5 to chip into the Rockets’ lead at halftime at 19-16. The teams tied in the third quarter, each scoring nine, to set up the late-game push that eventually lifted the Rockets to the win.

Roscoe’s return to the lineup came after he was finally able to get a full week of practice in for the first time in four weeks.

Following the team’s Monday practice, which was a yoga session, Roscoe, who is averaging 15 points per game this season, was able to get up and down in practice on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday to prepare himself to return on Friday.

“It was great to see Ryan back on the court,” Marcini said. “I think he is still trying to get comfortable out there a little bit. To trust things a little bit and get that bounce back, but I was happy he was able to finally get back out there.

“One thing about Ryan is that he knows how to put the ball in the basket,” Marcini added.

Roscoe was one of three players to reach double figures in scoring for the Rockets on Friday. Robinson led the way with 14 points, including an eight-point first quarter, while Braden Hodge also had 10 points for Streetsboro.

Ethan Laryea had five points, nine rebounds and four assists, while Janiere Cook added six points, five rebounds, five assists and five steals.

Field’s scoring leader was Silveus with 11 points, while Brian Fox scored all nine points in the first half on three made 3s. Silveus also had a team-high six rebounds and three assists.

Twice Field had cut the lead to three points — 26-23 and 28-25 — and had opportunities to cut closer, but never found the next big basket to get over the top.