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DANVERS, Mass. -- If there's any doubt about East Boston head coach Malcolm Smith's ability to utilize his resources, let tonight's result against St. John's Prep stand as Exhibit A -- and close the case shut.

Dressing just nine players, and without starting forwards Kenny Ramos and Kwandell Bush due to a violation of team rules -- certainly not the first time he's disciplined a key player, nor the last -- the Jets turned in one of their most inspired defensive first halves of the regular season. They held the host Eagles to just 16 points in the first two quarters, then staved off a furious fourth-quarter rally to win, 58-52.

"With this team, it's a bunch of guys that, hey, they just want to do it," Smith said. "They want to do it for their hometown, they want to do it for where they come from. I told them going into tonight's game that, listen, we've got to play this like we're in Dorchester House in the preseason fall league.

"I said fellas, you know, we're undermanned and we've always had some adversity, whether it's dressing five there or seven there, so you've got to take that mentality there. And we always play hard, but you've got to bring it in here a little bit more structured and disciplined, and that's what they did."

The Jets (12-4) dominated the first half, forcing a slew of turnovers with dogged backcourt pressure and sideline traps to make up for their lack of scoring ability at the offensive end. They took a 24-16 lead into the break, and led as much as 41-24 with under three minutes to go in the third quarter before the Eagles (10-6) mounted an impressive rally.

Down 43-32 to start the final frame, Prep cut the lead to 47-45 when Mike Carbone came up with a strip steal at halfcourt and heaved a lob to Steve Haladyna (31 points, eight rebounds), picking up a foul in the process. He missed the free throw, but capped a perfect 5-for-5 start from the field for the quarter with the lay-in.

At the other end, Eastie broke through some intense Prep backcourt pressure to convert some key field goal attempts down the stretch, none bigger than a dunk by Will March (16 points) with under a minute to go. With the Eagles gambling big time in moving their 2-3 zone high up in the halfcourt and converging on guard Pat Santos in the backcourt, he was able to get the ball over the top to a wide open March underneath and make it 57-49.

Freshman point guard Marcos Echevarria hit a three-pointer to close it to 57-52 with 31 seconds left, and fouled Santos to send him to the line and push the lead back out to six. But on the ensuing possession Freddy Shove missed a driving layup with 14 ticks to go, and three bodies converged on the loose board for a jump ball, and Eastie possession.

Helping out: The Jets were most impressive defensively in pressuring the backcourt, and providing help on the perimeter. Anybody who has watched Eastie over the years knows an aggressive press defense is its source of pride, and for the first 16 minutes an array of guards made life difficult for whoever took the ball in, harrassing them from the baseline to over halfcourt. From there, players like Zack Gattereau, Travon Moore, Ian Jones, Andre Senior and Kyle Fox were able to lend a hand.

In the halfcourt, the Prep is traditionally a tough out for its surgery running the motion offense -- a scheme that, by nature, is difficult to gameplan for. But whenever Connolly called for a pick-and-roll, an Eastie defender was usually in proper place on the help side to take a good angle and try to pick the ball off.

Those two areas led to a number of turnovers, both forced and unforced, including 11 total team steals.

"We worked on that yesterday," Smith said of the pick-and-roll defense. "And I don't really think it settled in. But you know, in the pre-game today, [I told them] 'Fellas listen, on their pick-and-rolls we've got to play it NBA-style'. They liked that, and I just thought it was phenomenal today.

"Ain't much I had to do with it, but we worked on it yesterday and it didn't really go that well. But today they communicated exceptionally well on it, they were able to hedge on everything else."

EAST BOSTON, Mass. -- Sometimes it's just a matter of getting back to basics, and doing what you do best.

In the case of the East Boston boys basketball team, what they do best is play defense. The Jets know they won't fill up a stat sheet in the offensive end. What head coach Malcolm Smith loves to see, however, is numbers spilling into the margins in the turnover column and at least an even matchup in the rebounding section.

No. 21 Eastie rediscovered its dogged, defensive mentality at the right time, forcing 26 turnovers in a 68-42 victory over No. 22 Madison Park Thursday night at East Boston High.

It was a big win for the Jets (12-4) on a number of fronts. First, it puts them up by a game atop the Boston City League's North division ahead of both Madison Park (12-2) and Charlestown, giving them an edge for one of the division's two spots for the upcoming City playoffs. It also wipes away the bad taste of Tuesday's 73-66 loss to the Townies.

And finally, this win was about Eastie getting back to the roots of what has made it a successful basketball team.

"It was a reality check for us on Tuesday night over at Charlestown, in terms of us being a family, us having to fight to the finish and not taking possessions off," admitted Smith. "The bottom line is, it took 15 games for us to realize we're a family, that we need every single person on this team to contribute, both defensively and offensively."

Missing a pair of regulars meant that contributions had to come from everywhere at both ends of the floor. Zack Gattereau led the offense with 15 points, Kyle Jimenez-Fox added 13 and Kenny Ramos chipped in with 12. Defensively, led by Travon Moore and a strong effort off the bench from Algino Jean, the Jets forced 11 of the 26 turnovers in the first quarter and out-rebounded the bigger Cardinals, 36-35.

Gattereau was big in the first half, dropping a 3-pointer at the end of a 12-1, first quarter run and scoring 11 of his 15 in the first 16 minutes. The MP Machine was able to cut the deficit to four points (22-18) midway through the second, but Eastie closed out the half with six free throws and an 11-5 spurt for a 33-23 advantage at the break.

"We were shorthanded this game because we didn't have all of our players so all of us had to bring extra intensity on the defensive end and that's what we did, turn defense to offense easily," Gattereau said. "I was just trying to get offensive boards to get me going and hope my teammates would find me after that."

The Cardinals appeared ready to rally in the third, but every time they put a couple of baskets together, Jimenez-Fox was there to knock down an open three. He did so three times, and each trey put the Jets back up by double digits.

"Our objective was to just play hard and the way we prepared in practice," Jimenez-Fox said. "We had to fast break to beat this team. We weren't trying too many set plays. Our guards were driving down the middle and the wings would collapse and they kicked it out to the wing and I was wide open."

Strong defense makes for a happy coach: Smith couldn't but help smile after watching his squad turn in a superlative defensive performance. The Jets mixed parts of a 1-3-1 zone with a lot of basic man-on-man defense and timely trapping in the corners with great success.

And it was truly a team effort. Six players had at least four rebounds, Gattereau added to his offensive night by keeping close tabs on MP big man Dakim Murray (six points, 12 boards), and everyone on the floor seemed to have a steal or at least be in the mode of disrupting Madison's flow.

"Travon Moore brings more defensive flair than anybody and more grit and inten sity, and Algino Jean came off the bench and sparked our defense tremendously today," Smith praised. "Those two were big and Charles Hines, a sophomore, came off the bench and got a key steal. The thing I'm more proud of than anything, it was 85 percent man to man today and that right there showed the grit of this team."

"I don't usually celebrate wins or get too gassed up about them, but this one felt very good," he continued. "Not just because it was a rivalry but because we got back to being who we were."

Lamenting a tough night: Madison Park coach Dennis Wilson is a veteran of the hardcourt wars, and he has been on both sides of the coin more times than even he would care to count over the years.

David Stewart led all scorers with 17 points and six rebounds and Rayshaw Matthews added 13, but Wilson found very little on the positive side to take away from this loss.

The Cardinals now have to beat Snowden and then capture a rematch with a resurgent Charlestown if they want to reach the City playoffs.

"They are a very aggressive team, they play hard they come at you and you have to be able to deal with that, keep your composure, find open people, attack the basket," Wilson explained. "We didn't do that. We lost our composure. We started off pretty good and then we fell apart, throwing the ball away. Last time I checked, we were wearing burgundy, they were wearing white. We were throwing it to white shirts. We panicked."

"Nobody played well. Nobody," he continued. "We didn't box, we threw the ball away, we didn't attack the basket, we didn't defend, we didn't do anything right. So all we can do, and sometimes good teams have days like that. I'm hoping we got it out of our system. We'll file this away, everyone will be honest with themselves and realize they didn't play well."

ROXBURY, Mass. -- Sometimes, it’s better to look at the scoreboard than the state sheet.

That is something that East Boston boys basketball coach Malcolm Smith will have to remind himself after Thursday night’s 61-59 win over Madison Park. The stats did not paint a pretty picture for the visiting Jets. They made just 2-of-25 free throws in the second half (yes, you read that right). Madison Park out-rebounded the Jets by a 45-27 margin.

However, Eastie forced Madison into 32 turnovers –- including 20 in the first half –- and the Cardinals (6-1) could not capitalize on the Jets’ inability to put the game away late.

“I’ll take any win,” said Smith, whose team improves to 5-2. “As I told everybody before, we’re just not that really good. We just play with a lot of emotion and we play very hard.”

And they play suffocating defense at times, which Eastie them build a 40-27 halftime lead. Led by Dakim Murray (18 points, 16 rebounds) and Rayshaw Matthews (19 points), Madison began to chip away in the third quarter, twice getting within four points. But baskets by Eastie's Kyle Fox and Kenny Ramos pushed the advantage up to 51-41 heading into the final stanza.

A drive into the lane and finish from Madison's David Stewart (seven points, 12 rebounds) cut the deficit to 53-48, before a put-back from Ramos and layup by Pat Santos off another Madison turnover made it 59-49 with just 2:10 to play.

The game was not close to being over, though, as the Cardinals -- led by Murray and Matthews -- went on an 8-1 run to make it 60-57 with 50 seconds left.

Eastie continued to miss free throws, and Terell Matthews of Madison made a pair with 21 seconds left to make it 61-59.

But despite the Jets missing four more freebies in the final 17 seconds, the Cardinals could not get any quality looks in the final moments and Eastie escaped with the win.

It's in the Books: The first quarter took about as long as most halves because of problems with the scoring books. First, East Boston was hit with a technical foul because Algeno Jean went to the free throw line but was apparently not in the Madison Park book. That ordeal lasted maybe 10 minutes.

Shortly after, the game was stopped again because of an inaccuracy over the score. While East Boston was up, 15-10, the Madison Park scorekeeper had it at just 12-10. The delay caused some frustration and confusion all over the gym, but was eventually sorted out.

The Eastie Swarm: The East Boston halfcourt press made life miserable for Madison Park in the first half and it proved to be one of the keys to victory. One reason why the Jets can play with such a ramped-up intensity level is their depth. While East Boston does not have a ton of size, the Jets do have a seemingly endless well of aggressive guards to bring off the bench and act as pests to opposing ballhandlers.

On Thursday night, the player who stood out the most for his effort was senior Travon Moore. Despite coming off the bench, Moore led Eastie with 12 points, and his hustle set the tone when other facets of Eastie’s game were not up to par.

Cards Control the Crease: Although Madison played inconsistent, especially against Eastie’s pressure in the first half, part of that had to do with the Cardinals missing starters O’Shea Joy (asthma) and Dane Lawladownie (ankle).

However, the Cardinals can take solace in the fact that they had a very strong effort in the paint. Murray is 6-foot-4 and burly enough to push his way into position, while Stewart is an athletic presence at 6-3 who can go up and snatch rebounds away from taller players. If the Cardinals can get healthy and take better care of the ball, they will be a tough out in the city.

“We only have ourselves to blame,” said Madison Park coach Dennis Wilson. “We missed too many foul shots and made too many turnovers. But that’s what happens with a young team.”