Chaminade's Kyle Dillon scores 16 points to lift Flyers past Elmont for second straight win

Kyle Dillon and the Chaminade boys basketball team seem to like playing in Elmont.

The day after its overtime win against Holy Trinity at UBS Arena — the first high school basketball game played at the venue — Chaminade defeated host Elmont, 53-37, in the annual public-Catholic school tournament on Saturday.

Dillon had 16 points, four rebounds and two steals against the Spartans after scoring 17 points on Friday against the Titans.

"I knew we were coming off being 0-and-2, so it was more about the team than myself," Dillon said after Saturday's win. "Coming from UBS, I knew it would be a challenge from the bright lights, but I knew we could do it.

Dillon made a layup on the baseline as the buzzer sounded to close the first half. The Flyers (2-2) used a 10-2 run late in the second quarter to take a 26-14 lead at halftime.

Elmont stepped up its defensive pressure early in the second quarter, but that didn't stop Dillon.

"I thought I came out pretty flat. It took me a second to get going," Dillon said. "But something sparked, because coming into the third quarter, I was able to get layups — not just from me creating — it was guys setting me up."

Although the Flyers struggled with turnovers in the first half, coach Dan Feeney did not seem overly concerned.

"Honestly, if we give that effort, I can live with the turnovers. We can clean that up and get better spacing," Feeney said. "We play every day, we spend a lot of time with each other, we will make better decisions. So if we put in that effort, we will clean up those mistakes."

Ian Laurencin came off the bench and made an immediate impact for Chaminade. The junior wanted to apply what his coach preaches in practice: effort and being unselfish.

"It's good to score, but at the end of the day, it's about impacting winning," Laurencin said. "We only do that by doing the little things. That gets reinforced in practice, and we go in as a team and I bring my defensive intensity and I just want to impact winning."

Elmont's Arlyn Brown, who totaled 12 points, made two three-pointers in the third quarter to try and get the Spartans (3-3) back in the game. But the Flyers had a response.

Chaminade, which emphasizes defense and crashing the glass, held Elmont to just two made field goals in the fourth quarter.

"Just giving an effort on that end of the floor is probably something that doesn't come naturally to these guys,” Feeney said. But I told guys like Mike [Wede] and Ricky [Gunther] that when they give that effort, it just sparks our team."