Mountain Valley fights past a stubborn York team.
By Randy Whitehouse
Staff Writer

AUGUSTA – It became clear from the opening stages of Saturday night’s Western Class B quarterfinal between No. 7 York and No. 2 Mountain Valley that the team that stayed patient and held its composure at key moments would survive.

York made patience and composure the deciding factors by dictating a slower tempo, but it was undefeated Mountain Valley that kept its composure down the stretch for a 49-38 victory at the Augusta Civic Center.

The Falcons, who made more free throws (18) than field goals (15), move on to face No. 3 Gorham in the semifinals.

York’s plan to use a Princeton-style spread offense to keep scoring down worked to near perfection for the first three quarters. But in the fourth, Mountain Valley(19-0) began clogging the passing lanes and forced the Wildcats (9-11) to match their number of first-half turnovers (nine) in the final eight minutes. The turnovers snowballed into a game-turning 12-0 run as the Falcons scored five more points in the fourth quarter (27) than they did in the first three combined..

“I thought what they did was very smart and very effective,” said Mountain Valley coach Ryan Casey. “We just survived it.”

As York watched a six-point lead dwindle to a one-point deficit, frustration set in. The Wildcats top scorer, Brandon Arsenault (13 points) picked up a foul and a technical to foul out with 4:02 left, giving the Falcons four free throws and the ball. Marcus Palmer made one of the two technicals, then Byron Glaus drained his two free throws to make it 35-31.

“We really stress composure, and there were times we were getting frustrated and I was really afraid we were going to lose our composure, but we found it and made some big shots.” Casey said.

Palmer followed the free throws with a trey from the top of the key. Glaus then swiped the ball on York’s ensuing possession and took it to the other end for a layup that made it 40-31 with 3:38 left.

“The young players and the seniors put together an extremely good game plan and executed it for three and a half quarters,” York coach Rick Brault said. “I thought we held them at bay and had them at our tempo, but then the dominos started to fall.”

“It’s a weird thing. We have spurts like that where we seem untouchable,” said Glaus, who came off the bench to score eight of his team-high 12 points in the fourth quarter. “To get (Arsenault) out of the game was definitely big for us. We felt a momentum shift there.”

Momentum shifts were rare for the first 24 minutes thanks to York’s patience on offense. Usually that patience was rewarded by a layup off a backdoor cut or an open 3-pointer for Arsenault. The main benefit for the Wildcats, though, was keeping the score down against the more talented Falcons. York led 6-4 af the end of the first quarter, then extended it to a 15-6 lead before Palmer, Glaus and Andy Shorey started to heat up from the outside to pull the Falcons within 17-15 at halftime.

“Not a lot of teams do that (stall game) to us. We talked about it in practice, but I don’t know, we really weren’t that ready for it,” Glaus said. “We talked about it during timeouts, about getting out in their passing lanes, but that was really hard.”

York went on a 7-0 run to start the third quarter, taking a 24-15 lead when Phillip Alibrandi found Joseph Corsello on a backdoor cut for a layup midway through the quarter. The Falcons whittled the margin back down to two, but Ryan Maran’s leaner with one second left in the quarter made it a six-point game.

Despite having their top inside threat, Jarod Oldham, rotting on the bench with four fouls, the Falcons pounded the ball inside to begin the fourth, first to Matt McCann (10 points), then back-to-back to Andy Shorey (six points) for a 6-0 run to tie the game at 28. Arsenault then hit a trey to put York back in the lead, but a pair of Travis Fergola free throws started the fateful 12-0 run that turned the game. Seven of those points came at the free throw line.

The Falcons shot well from the charity stripe all night (18-for-24), particularly down the stretch, to put the game away.

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