Kennedy falls to Wings in borough finals

Valentine’s Day brought heartbreak to the John F. Kennedy campus’ basketball team, which lost the Bronx Borough Championship to Wings Academy 68-53. Saturday marked the second consecutive borough final the Knights have lost to the Wings and the academy’s third title in the past four years.

“We played hard and the players really tried to do what we asked,” said JFK assistant coach J.C. Mathis, “so we’re happy as coaches [although] we fell short.”

The outcome marked a major improvement for Kennedy compared to their regular season games against the Wings, even though top JFK scorer Justin Batiz was out. The Wings triumphed over the Knights 105-65 in December and 88-49 last month.

At the start of the borough championship game at Queens College, it looked like the momentum might have swung in the Knights’ favor.

Their strategy of containing the Wings’ power center Jessie Govan, who plans to play for Georgetown University next season, worked for the first half of the game. While the Knights sent the 6-foot-10 Govan to the free-throw line three times in the first quarter alone (he made four of the six shots), the Wings could not break far ahead of JFK, as they led by only three, 37-34, at halftime.

No individual on JFK’s young squad — which heavily rotated four juniors among the seniors — suffered the brunt of the Wings’ defense. But the returning champions maintained an intense full-court press throughout the game, putting the deft dribbling of senior guard Darryl Williams to the test.

Senior guard Issac Arhin led JFK with 17 points for the game. His marksmanship outside the three-point line helped the Knights keep the Wings’ lead within a manageable distance.

At halftime, Mathis urged his players to grind down the opposing defense.

“We’re shooting good. They don’t know how to guard more than 10, 15, 20 seconds,” he said, telling his protégés to keep passing the ball until holes opened up in the Wings’ defense.

However, JFK’s own defense proved to have difficulty against Govan in the third quarter.