Call it a broken circuit, a popped fuse, the playful pranks of someone who had gotten into the utility closet or the act of a passionate fan who just couldn’t bear to see what was happening on the Chaminade basketball court anymore Friday night.

Blame it on any one of the above reasons or even the gremlins, ghosts and ghouls from the old haunt across the way because the wiring in the new place is still fairly new and not prone to cause a blackout for 15 minutes; not in the fourth quarter of a game against Kellenberg anyway.

“It was a rough one, it was tough,” Chaminade point guard John Gallego said after the 63-51 loss. “They’re good. Anyone can beat anyone; it’s a tough loss but it is what it is.”

What it was looked to start out like a slaughter with the Flyers held to just 4 points in the first quarter – their lowest of the year – while Kellenberg went on a 15 point shooting spree.

Gallego had been held to just one basket in that forgettable first, but still managed to lead Chaminade with 13 points on the night along with 5 rebounds and helping to get the Flyers to whittle the gap down to more respectable numbers.

Coming into the 2011-12 season, probably no one would have predicted the run Kellenberg has been on, no one remotely guessing that the Firebirds would have rattled off a 7-0 run to start the season – their only loss coming to South Side – making a statement that it was tired after years of bottom and middle-of-the-pack feeding in the CHSBL and backing it up with wins over St. John’s, St. Anthony’s and now, the Flyers.

It is no secret that this is the best team that Kellenberg (9-1, 2-0) has fielded in the school’s history, dominated by the likes of Jeremy Arthur (16 points), Kevin Bowles (13 points) and Rob Gomiela (20 points, 13-15 FTs) to lead a front court that literally weaved in and out of the Flyers’ lines at one point, winding down the shot clock to next-to-nothing, toying with the defense, throwing down a school-yard gauntlet saying that they could score at will.

Even though St. Mary’s is no longer the class of this now-wide open league and there are no insane two-to-one blowouts, the Firebirds will inevitably start to draw comparisons with last year’s Gaels team, simply by looking down their beaks at the rest of the field.

For the Flyers, the true rival will always be St. Anthony’s and that will never change – there’s too much history there – but at least for now, in this sport, in this topsy-turvy season, the field’s wide open.