Connellsville in giving mood as turnovers lead to early deficit and loss vs. Centurions
GREENSBURG – Turnovers. Turnovers. Turnovers. That is the theme that Connellsville basketball coach Nick Bosnic has been stressing all week. Friday afternoon was no different as the Falcons dropped their fifth in a row, 66-59, to the Greensburg Central Catholic Centurions as the Greensburg Salem Christmas Classic came to a close.
As has been the case for the entire tournament, early turnover problems handed the Falcons yet another early deficit as the Centurions closed the opening quarter with a 10-2 run.
“We fell down early again,” said Bosnic. “We tried some lineup changes today in an effort to get some smaller, faster kids in there to get more pressure on the ball, but the turnovers just keep getting us.”
Among the lineup changes were Scotty Hartz and sophomore Mason Leos who were inserted into the starting lineup in place of Mike O’Matlick and Robbie Egan. Leos and Hartz combined to finish with 12 points.
Despite entering the second half down by 15, the Falcons played perhaps their best basketball of the entire tournament. Momentum slowly began to turn early in the third quarter when Alex Fogle was fouled hard on a three point attempt, the shot did not fall, but he went to the line and sank two of the three foul shots to give the Falcons something to build on.
Moments later, John Dilworth forced a turnover and drove the length of the court and capped the play with an impressive slam dunk that sparked the Falcons bench. Dilworth was fouled on the play and made his foul shot to complete the three point play. On the Centurions ensuing possession Dilworth made his presence felt on the defensive end of the court as he recorded his first of three blocked shots on the day.
“John had a good game and he’s a really good player for us,” Bosnic said. “What we have to do is try and work on some things so we can get him some help out there so we don’t have to keep relying on him so much. He’s used to do drawing a lot of double teams but we need to get him some help.”
Dilworth left the game at the five minute mark of the fourth quarter with his fifth foul of the afternoon. He finished the game as the Falcons leading scorer with 23 points, including seven of ten from the free-throw line.
Despite going winless at the three day tournament Bosnic came away encouraged with his teams effort and progress.
“Coming into this season we knew we were going to have to take it on a game by game basis,” Bosnic said. “We obviously didn’t plan on losing five in a row, but we had a lot of kids coming in here that didn’t have any varsity experience, so the important thing right now is to see some progress and get better, and I think that we are.”
Greensburg Central Catholics Franco Sebastiani was the game’s leading scorer with 30 points, which bumped his career total up to 1,437. That pushed Sebastiani ahead of Donnie Constantine on the GCC school scoring list. Constantine, who graduated in 1981, finished with 1,425 points.
“Sebastiani is a dangerous shooter,” said Bosnic. “We made some adjustments on him and I think we slowed him down a little bit, but he is a great player that’s going to make a lot of shots and today he did.”
Connellsville will return home after the New Year to take on the Franklin Regional Panthers on Wednesday night.