This long, rough Central New York winter has not spared the Cicero-North Syracuse boys basketball team. The Northstars were supposed to visit Utica Proctor last Tuesday night, but the threat of yet another storm caused a postponement. Now they will clash next Thursday night, with the possibility that the top seed for the Section III Class AA playoffs could be on the line. CNS (12-2) gave the state Class AA no. 15-ranked Raiders (12-1) its only loss of the season, 69-65, back on Dec. 15 at the Peppino’s Invitational at Henninger – and, of course, knocked off Proctor in last year’s memorable sectional final at Utica Auditorium on Anthony DelCoro’s banked-in 3-pointer at the buzzer. Now comes the next big CNS-Proctor encounter – but not before the Northstars went through an interesting weekend that included an 87-64 romp over Baldwinsville on Friday night, which gave head coach John Haas his 100th career victory, and a frantic rally to beat Central Square 67-57 on Saturday afternoon. B’ville was first, and in front of a home crowd, CNS flourished on the offensive side, bolting out to a 24-11 first-quarter lead. From there, the margin held over the next two periods, despite some nice production from the Bees’ trio of Kevin Roy (16 points), Kevin Drain (14 points) and Willie Hython (13 points). But CNS pulled away in the fourth quarter as it got another big effort from Zach Coleman. A week after torching West Genesee for 34 points, Coleman managed “just” 24 points this time, while Shakir Thomas drained four 3-pointers on his way to a season-best 16 points. Elliott Boyce was strong, too, earning 15 points as Josh Williams added 10 points. Vaughndell Brantley and Sam Nassar earned six points apiece. Less than 24 hours later, CNS was on the court again, fully expecting to dominate against a Central Square squad that was just 2-10 and had lost 61-36 to Nottingham the night before. That didn’t happen, though. Fired up against the reigning sectional champions, the Red Hawks seized a quick 18-11 lead, then continued to play well the rest of the half, leaving CNS down 30-26 going into the locker room. Haas switched to a 1-3-1 zone defense for the second half – and it worked. CNS held Central Square to nine points in the third period and moved out in front to stay, though it did need to make a series of free throws in the late going just to be sure. Coleman finished with 20 points as Riley Moonan, quiet in the B’ville game, rebounded with 18 points, most of them from four 3-pointers. Boyce had nine points, with Brantley (eight points) and Williams (seven points) close behind. Central Square’s T.J. Perkins had a terrific effort, leading both sides with 27 points.