Saint Francis' Kameron Ng drives to the basket against Le Jardin. Ng led the Saints offensively with 15 points in a win over the Bulldogs. Steve Erler | SL

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Sat, Jan 16, 2016 @

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Le Jardin

47

Saint Francis

66

Final	1	2	3	4
Le Jardin (9-5, 17-8)	9	10	14	14	47
Saint Francis (11-1, 24-6)	17	17	16	16	66

K. Ng 15 pts  3 3pm  2/3 FTs

M. Hashimoto 17 pts  2 3pm  5/7 FTs

MANOA – Whether it was outside or inside, Saint Francis School dominated Le Jardin Academy, 66-47, Saturday night to gain sole possession of first place in the Interscholastic League of Honolulu Division II boys' basketball race.

The Saints (5-0) drained 10 3-pointers and garnered 38 rebounds to dispatch the Bulldogs (4-1) in front of an enthusiastic homecoming crowd at the Clarence T.C. Ching Athletic and Music Complex.

Three Saints finished in double-figure scoring. Point guard Kameron Ng led the way with 15 points, followed by Bryce Nishida's 12 and Noah Kurosawa's 11. They also accounted for all of the Saints' 3-pointers. Nishida had four, while Ng and Kurosawa had three each.

But the Saints also owned glass. Supilani Meilei had 10 rebounds to go along with his six points. Isaac Crichton came off the bench and pulled down nine boards, while Boris Vukovic added seven.

Mitchell Hashimoto led all scorers with 17 points for the Bulldogs. Dominic Venezia had 15 and Jerry Lawson chipped in 11.

The Saints live off the treys. The three aforementioned Saints are among the top 10 in Division II. They opened the game with back-to-back 3s from Ng and Nishida and never looked back. Their shots weren't just inches behind the arc. They were more like from several feet. The high school and college 3-point line is 19 feet, 9 inches, but the Saints were firing from at least two feet from the arc. The NBA trey distance is 23-9.

"You can defend it, but when he's shooting in transition three feet from behind the 3-point line and dropping them, you can't defend that," Le Jardin coach Kenneth Powell said. "But it happens. That's basketball. We knew that coming in. We knew he (Ng) was capable of doing that."

But the Bulldogs were also hurting inside. They could not challenge the Saints under the boards. Saint Francis' 38 rebounds dwarfed Le Jardin's 14. Twelve offensive rebounds helped contribute to secondary shots that led to baskets for the Saints.

"It was a disaster," Powell said. "The second-chance points that they got, we touched the ball, but we didn't rebound the ball."

Meilei was one of the reasons the Bulldogs lost the battle under the boards.

"Supi's a beast inside," Saint Francis coach Ron Durant said. "Sometimes, he has to take over."

The Saints stormed out to a 17-9 first-quarter lead. They led by as many as 21 on two occasions, eventually taking a 34-19 lead into the half. Saint Francis did not let up and safely kept its double-digit lead the rest of the game. It was a nice sign for Durant. His team owned a 30-15 lead at the half against Damien on Thursday, only to get outscored 29-20 in the second half in a 50-44 win.

"Against Damien, we were up by 20 in a similar situation and we came out flat in the third quarter," Durant said. "So coming out strong in the third quarter (against Le Jardin) was huge for us. We've had a number of games where we've had nice leads in the first half, but the third quarter we seem to have a little let down, so we challenged our players to come out strong in the third quarter and take better shots. When we move the ball, make those four, five extra passes, it opens up our offense to easier shots."

Powell understands his team is better than it played and knows it's still early in the season.

"What I can live with now is that we didn't play our best basketball," Powell said. "I would be concerned if we played our best basketball and lost by 20 points. We missed free throws, gave up anywhere from 10 to 20 secondary points. That's the difference despite how Kameron (Ng) and the others shot the ball."

But luck of drawing of the schedule, the teams meet again Thursday at Le Jardin to start the second half of the double round-robin regular season.