Scotties hold off LH in overtime
Evan Sanders
Southmoreland’s Brandon Stone (center) grabs a loose ball through a host of Laurel Highlands defenders in overtime of their non-section contest.
Evan Sanders
Laurel Highlands’ David Runco (right) drives past Southmoreland’s Thomas Pisula (left) in the second half of Friday’s non-section action at Laurel Highlands.
Evan Sanders
Laurel Highlands’ Will Deichert (bottom) gains possession of a loose ball and keeps Southmoreland’s Zac Leighty (top) away from the ball in the first half of their non-section game Friday.
Moreso than simply winning an overtime road game, Southmoreland learned a valuable lesson in Friday night’s 77-70 non-section boys basketball win at Laurel Highlands.
The Scotties learned that no matter what defense coach Frank Muccino calls, it won’t work unless the players make up their minds to enforce it.
“We’ve been struggling all year defending the three-point line,” Muccino said. “Norwin made 10 of them against us and Canon-McMillan made 14. In the first half tonight, LH made seven.”
But Southmoreland was able to stop the bleeding in a turnaround third quarter by eliminating the three-pointer from LH’s arsenal and took a 49-48 lead into the final quarter. The Scotties gave up only three three pointers in the second half and overtime to pull out the win.
Brandon Stone led the way for Southmoreland (3-1) with 33 points and 15 rebounds, while Tanner Schwartz added 14 points, Tom Pisula 12 and Zac Leighty 10.
Bryce Laskey paced (2-2) LH with 29 that included four of his six three-pointers in the first half. David Runco (two three pointers) and Elijah Guynn scored 12 each.
“They switched to a 1-3-1 half court defense in the second half and that team has a lot of length. You can’t back away from pressure in that situation, you have to attack it,” LH coach Rick Hauger said. “Sometimes we did, but most of the times we did not. They made us become passive with their zone, which happens sometimes.
“I thought we played pretty well offensively in the first half. Our guys gave good effort for the whole game, but maybe we were a little fatigued in the second half.”
The Mustangs looked unstoppable in building a 41-29 lead at the break, with Laskey scoring 16 and Runco, Will Deichert and Hudson Novak also hitting a three-pointer.
“Some were just good looks, good shots,” said Muccino. “But not all of them. We switched from one defense to the next and after a while, I ran out of defenses to call. No matter what we did, they beat it.”
At halftime, he talked to his team about pride and attitude and it seemed to payoff.
“I just challenged them,” Muccino said. “I just said, ‘We’ve got to play better defense. You’ve got to take pride in stopping them.’ It’s not so much effort as it is attitude.”
The Scotties responded with a 20-7 scoring edge in the third quarter that turned the tide in their favor. LH forced the extra session with an 18-17 scoring edge in the fourth quarter, but it was all Southmoreland in the extra session.
“We kind of caught what they had in the first half,” Muccino said. “When you can get a good lead quickly in a four-minute overtime, that makes it tough to come back.”
Southmoreland scored the first nine points to grab a 75-66 lead and LH couldn’t come back.
“We had three guys (Laskey, Runco and Novak) with four fouls and we couldn’t attack,” Hauger said of the overtime period. “We needed to apply pressure to negate their size, but we just couldn’t do it.”
Both coaches were glad they got this game scheduled and hope it prepared them for the section grinds that lie ahead. LH hosts McKeesport in its Section 1-AAAAA opener on Tuesday, while Southmoreland hosts Burgettstown in its Section 4-AAA opener also Tuesday.
“We have played an athletic team in Woodland Hills, a team with size in Elizabeth Forward and a good combination of size and strength and shooting ability in Southmoreland,” Hauger said. “We’ll find out next week if that was good enough or not.
“We’ve gotta play better than we played tonight. Southmoreland is a good team, but we can’t let them have a 9-2 run. We’ve got to have it and bury them.”