It was a new week, and it was a different week for the Emmaus boys basketball team. Moving forward from one prominent Cedar Beach summer tournament in the Stellar Catch A Rising Star event, to the Sportsfest A-town Throwdown tournament, the Green Hornets achieved their main goal of making it to Sunday once again.

But just like at Stellar, the Hornets never had a full team for any of their games.

Senior forward Joey Polczynski missed every day but Sunday. Senior forward Brandon Rapose missed everyday due to injury. David and Matt Kachelries missed Sunday because of an AAU tournament.

"It's tough," said assistant coach Eric Farkas. "A lot of times during the summer we won't have some guys due to various reasons. We started a different lineup every one of our games. But we played well and made it to Sunday like we always want to. Winning the group was another good feat for us."

Unlike the double-elimination style of the Stellar Tournament, the Sportsfest A-town Throwdown uses round robin pool play with the top team from each group advancing to an elimination playoff style on Sunday.

Emmaus went 3-0 in some strong performances, defeating Octorara 77-64 on Thursday night, and Saucon Valley and Souderton on Saturday by scores of 44-31 and 52-42 respectively. The three double-digit victories were a shining moment of a good start to the weekend for the Green Hornets.

But then on Sunday, they ran into a hot Central Catholic team in the round of 16.

"Central just finished better than us at the rim," said Farkas. "They scored easier down low, and we just didn't really have it that game. We couldn't hit our shots, and I think the heat got to us a little bit with a thin bench."

The Kachelries brothers led the way in the opening win Friday night. Matt led the team with 16 points and David was close behind with 13.

On Saturday morning, the games were briefly moved indoors because of a light rain. And playing inside the Muhlenberg College gymnasium suited Micaiah Fraction just fine. The rising senior connected on eight three-pointers, scoring a game-high 28 points in the win over the Panthers.

"Micaiah is a great shooter, and it only improves when he's indoors," said Farkas. "He was lights out that game, and we really needed him to be because we needed a spark on offense."

With a tie score at halftime of the final game of the group Saturday night, Emmaus outscored Souderton 30-20 behind a team-high 15 points from Jacob Feiertag.

But with a lack of depth and the sun beating down, the Green Hornets just didn't have enough to defeat a quality EPC foe in the Vikings on Sunday morning.

After a couple of days off this week, Emmaus will be back on the courts at Cedar Beach for the semifinals of the summer league playoffs Thursday night against Bangor.