Hawks Battle for Great Road Win at North Kingstown

Many sports teams have their own personal house of horrors on the road.

For those old enough to remember, the Providence College Friars once had to experience the torture of what was called the "snakepit", officially known as The Palestra in Philadelphia, where they would face Villanova each year....and each year, they'd get their heads handed to them.

For the Boston Celtics, for about a decade it was the Spectrum in Philadelphia (seems to be a theme there), where the Sixers would always pound the Green; it wasn't until the Celtics came back from a 17-point deficit in Game 6 of the 1981 Eastern Conference Finals that the Celtics finally broke through, on their way to overcoming a 3 games-to-1 deficit in a classic series showdown between those two teams.

In football, the Patriots had to endure the horrors of the Orange Bowl for what seemed a lifetime, until they thrashed the Dolphins in the AFC Championship Game in 1986.

To a lesser extent, then, it's kind of understandable when Coach Gomes was relieved to come out the the North Kingstown High School Gym with a tough 37-34 win over the Skippers on Tuesday night....it was the first time our guys had done so in five years.

"It was a good game", Coach said. "Two tough, defensive-minded teams that battled for the whole game. It was a good win."

With the win, the Hawks go to 2-0 in Division 1 play (2-1 overall, having lost a tough one to Corner Canyon/Utah this past Saturday night).

As usual, The Network was there, but the live broadcast was problematic, as there were serious wi-fi issues in the NK gym. We finally were able to broadcast live the entire second half, but the play-by-play audio was non-existent. In any event, we did our best. Cam Brennan and Johnathan Feeny were there to do said audio work, but it didn't really pan out for them. Sam LaFrance handled the social media end, and Conner Saulnier took detailed notes on in-game developments.

As the final score indicates, the game was largely a tough, hard-fought, back-and-forth affair. The Hawks led for most of the first half, but never by more than five points. The Skippers continued to dig in throughout and managed to go into the locker room at halftime having tied the game at 17. One of the problems that plagued our guys throughout the first half and the game in general was their allowing the Skippers to crash the offensive boards, as they collected seven against only two for the Hawks. The Skippers got countless second shot and put-back opportunities off their efforts that helped to keep them in the game.

As the second half got underway, it looked as though the Hawks were going to assert themselves and take control of the game, opening the second fram with a 6-0 run and stretching their lead to nine, 33-24, a run that was punctuated by a put-back jam in transition by freshman Preston Santos.

North Kingstown refused to go quietly, however, as they gutted through most of the remainder of the contest by going on a 10-2 run, closing the Hawks' lead to 35-34. Preston Santos once again closed the scoring by jamming through a fourth Hawks' putback to give our guys the 37-34 win.

From here, we head to Orlando to compete against some of the top competition in the country in the Walt Disney Classic - "we" being the operative term, since not only is the basketball team heading south, but The Network is tagging along for the ride, and we'll bring all the live action to Hawk Nation right here on The Network site. Cam Brennan, Stone Freeman, Remy Morris, Max Zweiner, and the incomprable "DT" Barron will be representing the #FORCEOFNATURE that The Network has become, and there'll be lots of action beyond just the games - we're tentatively planning a pre-trip show, live from Hendricken before we head for the airport, and then we're planning on live wrap-up shows from the hotel rooms - which, to be frank, has the potential for hilarious distaster. So, stay with The Network for the next few days - December 26th-31st - you won't regret it.