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Dolphins to play in finals minus Cruz, Rabauliman
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Posted on Feb 26 2009
A depleted Marianas High School crew will be facing Kagman High School in the championship match in the boys varsity division of the 2008-2009 MISO Basketball League tonight at the MHS Gymnasium.
The Dolphins will try to regain the title they lost to Saipan Southern High School last season without key players Jericho Cruz and Marvin Rabauliman, who were booted out of the team.
MHS coach Mark McDonald, in a telephone interview with Saipan Tribune yesterday, confirmed Cruz and Rabauliman were off the team. He declined to elaborate why the two players were kicked off the squad, but in the past, Rabauliman and Cruz were given disciplinary actions for violating team rules.
In the first game of the season, Cruz and Rabauliman were benched in the first half of their game against Southern for failure to attend practice sessions.
Before their last assignment in the regular season, Rabauliman was suspended for one game and missed the Dolphins’ second meeting with the Rays.
Cruz, in a telephone interview with Saipan Tribune, said he was told he was off the team last week. He last played for the Dolphins on Feb. 11 when MHS pulled off an 83-75 overtime win over the Ayuyus.
Cruz was nursing a flu that day and started playing only in the fourth quarter. He scored six of the Dolphins’ 12 points in overtime to lift MHS to the win.
The member of the CNMI Nationals said he was sick for four days on the week MHS played Kagman.
“I had a doctor’s slip showing I am sick and not skipping class when coach (McDonald’s) saw me in Capital Hill,” Cruz said.
Rabauliman, who is Cruz’s teammate in the CNMI Nationals, could not be reached to comment on his exclusion on the Dolphins’ roster.
Asked how the absence of Cruz and Rabauliman, who averaged in double figures in scoring for MHS, will affect the Dolphins’ chances in the title match, co-coach Nick Gross said they had already prepared for this situation last week.
“We’ve been preparing for the finals since last week without them and hopefully these preparations will be enough to give Kagman a good game in the finals,” Gross said.
“We will be playing a disciplined basketball. We will be playing with pride and heart,” Gross added.
