Stamford Peace Wins Live in the A.C.
Cinderella went dancing in Atlantic City this week as Stamford Peace completed an improbable run to the seventeen-and-under championship at Live in the A.C.
CONGRATS to the 2014 17U #LIVEinAC Champions @StamfordPeace. Great ending to a Cinderella run through the tournament. pic.twitter.com/2rgyzQhdn6
— Elevate Hoops (@ElevateHoops) July 25, 2014
While half of the teams in the seventeen-and-under bracket earned first round byes, Peace wasn’t one of them. They opened with a 65-53 win over Team Takeover White on Wednesday night and then scored the first big upset of the week by knocking off Jersey Shore Warriors on Thursday before closing the day with a win over Brooklyn Rens to advance to the quarterfinals.
They opened Friday’s action with a hard fought win over the Patterson Playaz in the quarterfinals, returned for a semifinal win over the PA Renegades, before outlasting King Street Kings in the final to finish a perfect 6-0 on the week.
Jeremia Livingston, a five-foot-eleven playmaking guard from Westhill High School in Connecticut, was huge from start to finish. Livingston had a monster junior season in the CIAC, scoring 40 or more points on five different occasions, and yet still continued to fly under the radar throughout the school and travel seasons.
That won’t be the case anymore as he not only showed his talent and instincts with the ball in his hands, but also demonstrated even better upside once he’s able to add some muscle to his frame.
Will Rayman was his offensive counterpart for most of the week. The six-foot-seven forward stars at the Millbrook School, one of the few New York based prep schools to compete in the NEPSAC. A skilled and versatile offensive player, he had his total game going on Friday to score from all three ranges.
Kwe Askew is a six-foot-seven big man from Stamford High School who played his way into the NERR database back in April at the Northeast Hoops Festival and has continued to make nice strides since. He anchored the interior from start to finish this week.
Peace also got good contributions from the likes of Tyrell St. John and Ryan Kriftcher, who will be a post-graduate guard at Taft next season.
The championship punctuates what has been a successful summer for the Peace after turning out good results in Springfield and Manheim alike.
Brian Kriftcher, the program’s founder and head coach, said that seven of the team’s 10 players have come up with the program since they were in elementary school, making this their final week together after more than a decade of being teammates.
The final chapter of their collective story couldn’t have been written any better as they came to Atlantic City and hit the jackpot.
Kwe Askew
Jeremia Livingston