CURWENSVILLE-Head coach Matt Wassil had a lot of praise for his Golden Tide basketball team following a 47-28 victory over the Ridgway Elkers.
“We got the lead early in this game, which was something that we were unable to do in the previous week,” says Wassil.
The Tide proved to be all business early in the game by scoring the first eight points while the defense held the entire Elkers team to nine first-half points. Sam Gardner led the Tide in scoring with 19 points and two steals while both Alec Starr and Ben McGary led the team in rebounds with four each.
The Elkers found themselves playing from behind from the beginning despite getting the opening tip off. Ben Jaques led Ridgway with six points and three rebounds.
Coach Wassil credits the rebounding ability of his team for the victory, citing that even though no player had a high number of rebounds, they went after the ball and kept the Elkers behind all game long.
“We knew Ridgway had bigger guys inside, so we knew that securing the rebounds first would be important,” said Wassil.
Wassil also says that with his team being able to cause Ridgway to turn the ball over kept his team in front of the defense and that led to easy shots to run up the score.
Senior guard David Kalgren managed to get 11 of his 15 points in the first half, four of which came on the free-throw line, along with two steals that helped the Tide build a 27-9 cushion leading into halftime. In the third quarter, Gardner showed his ability as he scored Curwensville’s first eight points of the half while also getting a steal.
“Obviously Kalgren can score a lot of points, but Sam showed tonight that he can be our second scorer,” said Wassil.
Ridgway tried to make a game of it in the fourth quarter, outscoring Curwensville 13-4, but the Tide had already built a 28-point lead entering the quarter which proved to be too much for Ridgway to overcome.
In the junior varsity game, Ridgway defeated Curwensville 38-37.
The Golden Tide basketball team is back in action on the road Monday against Dubois Central Catholic.
Points By Quarter: 1st 2nd 3rd 4th FINAL
Ridgway: 5 4 6 13 28
Curwensville: 10 17 16 4 47
Game Stats
Rebounds: Ridgway-16 Curwensville-23
Free Throws: Ridgway-5 of 10 Curwensville-9 of 15
Three-pointers: Ridgway-2 (Maddalena, Jaques) Curwensville-1 (Kalgren)