BLUE SHIELD: Princeton High boys’ basketball player Zahrion Blue, left, looks to thwart a foe in recent action. Last Friday, sophomore forward Blue scored 12 points in a losing cause as PHS fell 58-48 to visiting Nottingham. The Little Tigers, now 4-5, play at Hopewell Valley on January 23 before hosting Allentown on January 26. (Photo by Frank Wojciechowski)

Zahrion Blue liked the way the Princeton High boys’ basketball team took care of its business in the early stages against visiting Nottingham last Friday.

“We were playing good in the first half,” said PHS sophomore forward Blue. “We came out at the start playing like a team.”

Blue gave the Little Tigers a big lift in the waning moments of the half as he drained a long three-pointer before the buzzer to put PHS up 24-18 at intermission.

“Time was running out and I had to shoot it,” said Blue, reflecting on his buzzer-beater.

PHS, though, got run out of its building in the second half as Nottingham outscored the Little Tigers 40-24 over the last 16 minutes of the contest to pull away to a 58-48 victory.

“It got to the point where we are not screening or cutting,” said Blue in assessing the team’s second half struggles. “We were just not running our plays right.”

Making the move up to varsity this year after starring for the PHS freshman team last winter, Blue is feeling right at home. “I have to play hard,” said Blue. “I think I should be on varsity; it is my level.”

Blue is looking to take his game to a higher level, working on honing his inside-out skills.

“I am a shooter so I like to be outside the three-point line,” said Blue. “I also like to play inside, be in the lane and dish it out to Kevin (Kane) and Matt (Hart).

PHS head coach Mark Shelley like the way his team played in the first half against Nottingham.

“I felt like we were patient with our offense,” said Shelley. “We ran our motion, we ran it side to side a few times. We had good looks. Defensively, I thought our zone frustrated them. They didn’t hit some shots but we also defended well. It wasn’t a clean first half but we were happy with it.”

Shelley was happy to see Blue come up big in the waning moments of the second quarter, believing that his buzzer beater would give PHS some momentum heading into the second half.

“Zahrion hit a three at the end of the first half,” said Shelley. “It was big, I thought it would give us a boost.”

Instead, Nottingham started hitting on all cylinders in the third quarter, seizing momentum by outscoring PHS 19-11.

“I told them the turning point in the game was that we got three steals in the first three minutes of the third and we turned every one of them over and they scored,” said Shelley. “So that it is a 12-point swing.  There was some adversity that we didn’t handle.”

PHS, though, battled back and took a 43-42 lead with 5:14 left in regulation but Nottingham responded with a 10-0 run to take control of the contest.

“Several times we have been in games like this and we haven’t closed them well,” said Shelley.

“The second thing that totally frustrated me was that is was back and forth a point here, a point there and when they got it to five, we just lost our composure. We didn’t do things we were supposed to do.”

In the wake of the frustrating setback, Shelley asked his players to catalog the things they need to be doing better.

“I think the lesson is always take whatever mistakes happened and be better with those mistakes the next time,” said Shelley, whose squad plays at Hopewell Valley on January 23 before hosting Allentown on January 26.

“They all have a little homework assignment for the weekend — to watch the tape and bring me a written list of things they can do better on offense and defense. They have a certain number to bring me and we are going to watch film and then practice on Monday. I want them to be able to look at it and say these are the things the coaches and my teammates expect me to do and these are the things we are doing.”

In Blue’s view, the lessons from Friday are clear. “We should just do better things,” said Blue. “We need to have better shot selection and just play basketball.”