Woodbridge earns win over Colonia at LeGrand/Haley Holiday Jubilee

COLONIA - The Woodbridge High School boys basketball team kept its hot start to the season going on Friday afternoon at the final game of the Eric LeGrand/Gene Haley Holiday Jubilee at Colonia High School.

The Barrons improved to 6-0 with a 64-40 victory over rival Colonia, and beat the Patriots for the first time since the 2012-13 season.

"It's always a rivalry," Woodbridge's Harry Rutkowski said. "It's always a hard game because everyone is playing against kids you know. It always feels great, so now we have the say in the town."

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For Colonia head coach Brandon Hall, it also marked the first time he faced his former team. Hall, who was the JV coach and varsity assistant with Woodbridge, took over at Colonia this past summer. 

"That was very emotional because that's our guy," Woodbridge's Hura Blaine said of Hall. "We talked to him all the time."

"We're playing and we're looking to him on the sidelines and he's screaming, 'Let's go white,' and we're wearing black," Rutkowski added. "He's our coach, he was with us for awhile."

After a close back-and-forth first quarter in which Colonia (2-3) took a 10-9 lead, the Barrons stepped it up in the second quarter. After the Patriots went up 12-9 on a basket by Luke Valeriano, Woodbridge went on a 10-0 run highlighted by two three-point plays by Kemari Persol and Hura Blaine to take a 19-12 lead with 5:06 remaining. 

Colonia outscored the Barrons 7-6 during the remaining 4:53, but Woodbridge held a 25-19 lead at halftime.

"Defense definitely, we kept them to 19 points in the first half, which is really low for a high school game," Rutkowski said. "Anytime you can keep a team to single digits in a quarter is great."

The Patriots got within 32-27 with 2:44 left in the third on two free throws from Frank Lehman, but the Barrons went on another 7-0 run to take a 39-27 lead with 1:16 left, and led 41-32 after three quarters. 

After a 3-pointer from Connor Bevilacqua to open the fourth quarter that pulled Colonia to within 41-35, a 10-0 run from Woodbridge put the Barrons up 52-35 with 4:42 remaining.

"Our chemistry, we all play together, no one ever singles out for points, we're all scoring equally," Rutokowski said of the Barrons' offense.

The Woodbridge defense then went to work and stymied the Patriots, as the Barrons outscored them 12-5 in the last 4:05 for the 64-40 final.

"We started all juniors last year, we've returned everybody from last year, so that's a big part of it," Blaine said of Woodbridge's success so far this season.

Rutkowski scored a game-high 16 points for Woodbridge, while Blaine finished with 15 points and five rebounds. Persol added 10 points and Keshaun Henry chipped in six points and five rebounds.

For Colonia, Valeriano led with 14 points and four rebounds and hit three 3s. Bevilacqua added 11 points, including three 3-pointers. 

Staff Writer Lauren Knego: lknego@gannettnj.com; on Twitter: @laurenknego