Rowan shoots Chiefs past Tritons

A game between Ft. Lauderdale Cardinal Gibbons and Mariner in the 42nd annual Culligan City of Palms Classic turned into a duel between Maverick Rowan and Rodney Hunter.

Rowan scored a game-high 35 points while Hunter kept pace with 31 in Gibbons' 63-55 win over the Tritons at Bishop Verot High School.

Rowan, the 46th-ranked junior in the country by Rivals, scored 15 of the Chiefs' 20 in the second period and 13 consecutive, part of a stretch that allowed Gibbons to turn a 13-10 deficit into a 30-24 lead at the half.

Every time it seemed as though Gibbons, the top-ranked team in Florida's Class 5A was ready to pull away, Hunter responded.

Perhaps the most spectacular play of the night was after the senior guard and Columbia University commit followed a missed 3-pointer by catching his own miss and throwing down a one-handed dunk, much to the crowd's delight.

"I thought this was a really good experience for us," Mariner coach James Harris said. "Gibbons is a really good team, and this was great game where we learned a lot. We just had too many turnovers and missed shots at the rim, and we need do better finishing and taking care of the ball."

Slow starts to each period doomed Mariner, but the third period was perhaps the worst. The Tritons went over five minutes without a field goal, during which the Chiefs stretched their lead to 12, 39-27. Hunter ended the drought with a layup after he inbounded the ball off the back of a Cardinal Gibbons player under the basket. He followed it up with a three to close within seven, but Mariner would get no closer.

Sophomore guard Sean Kostyk added 12 points for the Tritons, all of them from behind the arc.