LIVERMORE FALLS — After watching his team play an uneven first half, Mountain Valley coach Rick White tried to pump up his team in the locker room and may have fired himself up a little too much in the process.

White had to step outside Livermore Falls High School briefly in the third quarter to catch his breath in the fresh, crisp night air. By the time he returned, the Falcons had begun playing the stifling defense that would vault them past the similarly fired up Andies.

Jacob Arsenault, not exactly feeling 100 percent healthy himself, scored all 16 of his points in the second half, allowing backcourt-mate Cam Kaubris to lock down Livermore Falls star Chandler White on defense while the Falcons rallied from being down as much as nine in the first half to a 68-59 win in a physical battle between two of the top teams in the MVC.

Kaubris also finished with 16 points and Adam Bedard and Jon Benjamin chipped in with nine and eight points, respectively, as the Falcons improved to 12-0. White scored a game-high 20 points to lead Livermore Falls, which dropped to 9-3, but not without a fight after losing an earlier contest with Mountain Valley by 20 points.

“Coach really fired us up at halftime, just said the right things to the right people,” Kaubris said. “He didn’t necessarily get on us and say we were going to lose this game. He didn’t have to do that. He knew we had it within ourselves and he pushed the right buttons at halftime.”

White told the Falcons they needed to get tougher on the boards after Andies’ forward Mike Armstrong outworked them for 10 first-half rebounds. The second chances helped the Andies overcome 4-for-16 shooting from the floor in the second quarter as White and Derek Castonguay (12 points) led a steady procession to the free throw line. Castonguay sank two freebies to put Livermore up 36-27 late in the second. Kaubris’ buzzer-beating 3-pointer from the top of the key gave Mountain Valley something to hang its hat on for the second half.

Arsenault started the game defending White but got into first-half foul trouble, so White switched Kaubris onto the Andies’ dynamic senior guard. Kaubris held him to one field goal in the third quarter and the Andies, who seemed eager to run with the Falcons in the first half, slowed the pace in the third quarter. 

“When Jake got the three fouls, I just shook my head and said ‘I’m going to have to guard this guy now,'” Kaubris said. “I know (White) is 10 times faster than me, so I just tried to keep him from getting the ball. That was my main objective. It was pretty tough. He’s a good player.”

Freed up on the other end, Arsenault shook off the effects of the flu that forced him to sit out Tuesday’s practice and sparked a 10-2 run that put the Falcons in the lead for good to end the third quarter. Two free throws apiece from Arsenault and Derek Volkernick made it 47-46 Mountain Valley with 1:30 to go in the period. Arsenault converted a lefty layup and Kaubris scored on a drive for a 51-48 lead heading into the final quarter.

“I definitely woke up,” Arsenault said. “I wasn’t in (in the first half) and some other key guys weren’t in, so Kaubris had to try to do some of it by himself in the first half. But then in the second half, we came out with five players contributing.”

Arsenault combined with Kaubris and Benjamin as Mountain Valley drilled three of its first four 3-pointers in the fourth quarter (and eight of 16 for the game) to open its only double-digit lead at 62-52 midway through the period. The Andies pulled to within six on a three-point play by Tom Ventrella (10 points) and another three-point play off a circus shot by White with 1:10 remaining. But that would be Livermore’s last field goal and Arsenault and Izaak Mills combined to hit five of six free throws to ice the game.

The Andies were the aggressors early and got off to a sizzling start, shooting 9-for-13 from the field in the first quarter. On the rare occasion they did miss, Armstrong (eight points, 11 rebounds) was usually there to clean up the rebound. His putback put them up 10-9, a margin they expanded to six by the end of the quarter with a traditional three-point play by White and a long-range 3 by Ventrella.

“They were way more aggressive and we just got angry,” Arsenault said. “We got more physical in the paint and started getting a body on people.”