Josi­ah John-An­drews’ out­stand­ing per­for­mance helped Trin­i­ty Col­lege East emerge as the Boys’ Un­der-20 Di­vi­sion cham­pi­on in the T&T Schools Bas­ket­ball As­so­ci­a­tion’s (TTS­BA) East Zone League com­pe­ti­tion on Fri­day.

He notched a team-high 32 points to lift the Trin­i­ty East team to a thrilling one-point (72-71) win over Holy Cross Col­lege in the fi­nal at the Mal­oney In­door Sports Are­na. It was the sec­ond match of the af­ter­noon fol­low­ing Hillview Col­lege’s hard-fought vic­to­ry over San Juan South Sec­ondary for third place.

In the fea­ture match, Trin­i­ty Col­lege dom­i­nat­ed the first ses­sion, lead­ing 35-30 at half­time. Holy Cross did not fade though and with the ef­forts of Jer­vais Carac­ci­o­lo, N’ko­bie Ince and Caiden Chase man­aged to outscore their op­po­nent 41-37 in the sec­ond half but it was not enough to over­come their deficit.

John-An­drews with sup­port from Alex­ie Alex­is (19) and, Serge Robin­son (11) helped Trin­i­ty East, coached by An­dre Yorke, hold on to the nar­row one-point win.

For Holy Cross, Carac­ci­o­lo pro­duced a match-high 35 points while his team­mates Ince and Chase were al­so im­pres­sive of­fen­sive­ly with 20 and 14 points, re­spec­tive­ly, but in a los­ing ef­fort.

Ear­li­er in the bat­tle for third place, Samuel Ed­wards and Isa­iah Bourne pi­lot­ed Hillview Col­lege to a close 49-45 vic­to­ry.

Ed­wards, who top­scored with 19, and Bourne’s 15 helped Hillview to con­trol the match from the jump, hold­ing a 29-21 lead at the halfway mark.

San Juan South tried to re­bound in the sec­ond half, and cut Hillview’s lead but it was in­suf­fi­cient as they set­tled for the four-point de­feat and fourth place.

Lead­ing San Juan South’s of­fence was Nathan Bobb with 11 and Jev­er­son Au­gus­tine with 10.

Fri­day’s re­sults

Boys U-20 Di­vi­sion

Fi­nal

Holy Cross Col­lege (30) 71 (Jer­vais Carac­ci­o­lo 35, N’ko­bie Ince 20, Caiden Chase 14) vs Trin­i­ty Col­lege East (35) 72 (Josi­ah John An­drew 32, Alex­ie Alex­is 19, Serge Robin­son 11).

Third/fourth place play­off

Hillview Col­lege (29) 49 (Samuel Ed­wards 19, Isa­iah Bourne 15) vs San Juan South (21) 45 (Nathan Bobb 11, Jev­er­son Au­gus­tine 10)