It was what you’d come to expect. At least if you followed the Berkeley Carroll Boys Varsity basketball team this topsy turvy season.

There have been instances where the BC Lions haven’t played their best ball. However, that was far from the case at a crowded Friends Seminary gym yesterday afternoon where despite being two men short, they went toe to toe with one of the better ACIS teams before falling 74-70 in a great game.

If ever you might’ve expected the Lions to not be up to the challenge, it was yesterday afternoon on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. They were again without key starter Giancarlo Hirsch and reserve shooting guard Joe Longo meaning that against a very good opponent who boasted a full roster, Berkeley Carroll had only seven players for the first of two regular season meetings less than a week apart.

Friends Seminary had won the last two league championships including a nailbiting two-point win to repeat in 2007. They still had most of their players back with the notable exception of star big man Troy Whittington, who went on to play for Williams College.

It certainly seemed like a tall order to expect Berkeley to be able to go into their gym where at least four returning starters from that championship team were still around along with a few key additions from last year’s JV. When your coach basically has his pregame notes written out on the scorebook in the timeouts section, it’s usually not a good sign.

Apparently, Coach was praying to the basketball Gods to let his team play the way they were always capable of. Maybe he knew something because it didn’t start out promising for his shorthanded team which fell behind 13-2 forcing him to use a timeout.

Maybe the 11-point lead Friends built up gave them a false sense of security or just maybe a resilient Lions squad wasn’t ready to pack their bags and grab the train back to Park Slope. Whatever the explanation, suddenly the BC backcourt of senior Jason Lewis and junior Philip Seay started to play more aggressively getting into the lane, scoring and finding open teammates for buckets.

While they were BC’s best two scoring options, what couldn’t be overlooked was the job players such as Daniel Halper, Sam Adler, Max Peskowitz and John O’Shaughnessy did getting to loose balls for second chances. Halper stepped out and knocked down a three and also hit a few free throws and Adler also rebounded well and showed some range with a 17-footer from the left baseline. O’Shaughnessy’s play on the offensive end was inspired, repeatedly hurting Friends inside with some nice putbacks.

By the end of what was one of the most exciting first quarters, it was anyone’s game. Friends Seminary led 21-18. One thing was abundantly clear. The Lions weren’t going away. In fact, while a deeper opponent was getting flustered by BC’s hardnosed approach, the underdog gained more and more momentum as they continued to beat Friends’ players to the spot and get them into foul trouble.

It was now Berkeley who controlled the tempo of the game on a bigger court which worked perfectly for their offense, allowing speedy guards Lewis and Seay to get into the paint and also utilize the baseline to their advantage. The Lions had played so well on both ends that they slowly built a nine-point lead. It was also aided by a technical foul as the level of frustration on the Friends players was very evident.

How chaotic was this game? So much so that there were even moments where I couldn’t keep up with what was going on. You had two teams scoring very quickly making for  frenetic end-to-end action.

If Berkeley was to pull off the upset, they needed to find a way to slow down Friends’ top outside threat. I can’t recall the name but if they didn’t throw off No.24’s rhythm, there was no way they could win. He had a terrific first half seemingly hitting every open trey off well executed screens.

For two quarters, BC slowed him down enough to take an eight point lead early in the final quarter with the end almost in sight. Just when you thought they had it, the kid with the awkward flatfooted shot which you couldn’t believe was knocking ‘em down sprung to life as did his backcourt teammate No.12. At least that’s what Varsity girls basketball star Zoe Cohen concluded as did this writer.

Editor’s note: I had seen a spunky player like this once before. His name was Tim Hyland and he could knock them down from 28 feet out for Curtis High School when they were dominating the Staten Island High School League (SIHSL) winning championships. Thing is Hyland was even more flatfooted. He also was probably better as he could involve teammates with very smart passes.

It was the PG’s play which helped turn around the game. He’s one of those kids who can be lazy at times but when it’s on the line, suddenly flips on the switch. He was almost invisible for 24 minutes but when the pro-Friends crowd urged their school on, he stepped up much like in last year’s championship game where his transition lay-up gave them a league repeat. Here was the same player suddenly turning it on getting into the lane and either scoring or finding teammates- usually ‘ole reliable No.24 who went for a ridiculous 37 and drained at least six trifectas by the time it was over.

There was also a huge setup for one of their other players, who finally got an open three to go down. In the first half, the same kid missed one where you were sure it was down. This time, the ball bounced his way and against Berkeley Carroll.

With No.12 and 24 hitting all their free throws, it looked like the Lions’ valiant effort would fall short. In spite of some splendid play from Seay, whose big third quarter included an unbelievable trey after faking a shot and getting fouled. What a great play that was. It wasn’t the only one he made. He had 23 with more than half coming in that second half.

Lewis meanwhile had rebounded from a disappointing game on Senior Night. He stepped up all game and scored pacing his team with 28 which included a couple of extremely difficult off balance three’s in the last 60 seconds. It allowed his team to burn their final timeouts and hope they could either force a turnover or hope for missed free throws.

Unfortunately, the two money players for Friends didn’t cooperate as No.24 sank the last couple for the final four-point outcome.

Maybe the Berkeley players didn’t get the desired outcome but they won in a lot of people’s minds. Sometimes, you can’t measure what’s inside a team’s heart. They left it all out there and probably deserved a better fate.

Just maybe it will finally go their way when they get the same team again next Thursday at their home gym before the ACIS playoffs begin.

Nothing to hang their heads over on this day. Just an old fashioned well played game. Now it’s some much needed time off and then on to the next one.