Yacoubou, Lawton lead LI Lutheran past Rice
Long Island Lutheran's Shaun Lawton goes hard to the basket against Rice. (Jan. 17, 2011) Credit: Patrick E. McCarthy
The suburban school with a couple of city kids beat the city school with a roster full of New York products at its own game Monday in the Big Apple Classic.
Achraf Yacoubou from the Bronx and Shaun Lawton from Harlem were city slickers in leading Long Island Lutheran to a 72-63 victory over Rice of Manhattan at Baruch's ARC Center.
"Every city team we play is very good, so we know we have to play hard," said Yacobou, who had 27 points, 14 rebounds, five assists and four steals. He also had 10 turnovers for an unusual triple-double, a byproduct of the game's blistering pace. Lutheran pushed the ball upcourt whenever it could to counter Rice's height advantage.
Lawton, who like Yacoubou played the entire 32 minutes, had 12 points, seven rebounds, six assists and three steals. "I had a lot of family and friends here," Lawton said. "It felt good to beat my former school."
Cincinnati-bound Jermaine Sanders led Rice with 20 points.
Lawton, a 6-4 senior, played on the freshman team at Rice. Yacoubou, a 6-5 senior, played his freshman ball in Philadelphia and strongly considered Rice before transferring to Lutheran. "They wanted me,'' Yacoubou said, "but I wanted to get out of [New York] city because of all the distractions."
Yacoubou was a distraction to Rice (9-5) all afternoon as the game's leading scorer and rebounder. He scored five points during an 11-0 flurry to close out the first half that gave the Crusaders (13-2) a 39-30 advantage. They expanded it to 58-42 after three and coasted home.
The third quarter was Yacoubou's best, as he nailed three treys and scored 11 points. For the game, the Villanova-bound swingman shot 9-for-13 from the field, including 4-for-7 from downtown.
"Some people think I can't shoot, but ask any of my friends in the Bronx and they'll tell you I always was a good shooter," Yacoubou said. "I've worked so hard on the rest of my game, but I know I can shoot and I'm always confident when I take the shot."
Lawton and Mike Florin (12 points, four assists, three steals) give the Crusaders a pair of guards who are interchangeable. Both can play point guard or shooting guard, and they switch roles depending on the game situation.
"I'm 6-4 , so people think of me as the shooting guard," Lawton said. "But we play off each other. When I beat my man, I don't mind passing the ball."
One of Lawton's assists was a thing of beauty - a lefthanded bounce pass on the run to a cutting Yacoubou for a layup that gave LuHi a 60-44 lead early in the fourth quarter.
"I knew this was a big game for Shaun because he went to Rice," Lutheran coach John Buck said. "He talked about this game all year. He did a good job making decisions the whole game."
Perhaps the best decision Lawton - and Yacoubou - made was to enroll at Lutheran three years ago.
