AMESVILLE – The Curwensville Golden Tide boys basketball team opened its defense of the Moshannon Valley League title (tri-champions including Glendale and West Branch) Friday night by losing to a much improved Moshannon Valley team, 51-41, on the Black Knights’ home court.
The Knights are coming off a 4-17 season under second year head coach Kris Glunt.
Head coach of the Golden Tide, Shane Pentz, said afterwards, “We played just a terrible first half. Our offense couldn’t get it going at all. We missed lay-ups, open shots. It just wasn’t our night tonight.”
In spite of the sluggish offense and multiple mistakes, the Golden Tide found themselves knotted at 20-20 at the intermission.
The Tide offense was so stagnant that it didn’t get its first points until 3:34 was left in the first period on a three-pointer by junior guard Jake Terry.
Moshannon Valley had a 10-7 margin after the first eight minutes, while the Tide produced its best period by outscoring the Black Knight’s 13-10 to force the halftime tie.
Curwensville had its first lead, 20-18, with 52 seconds left in the first half on another bucket by Terry before Moshannon Valley sophomore Curtis Neff scored with just seven seconds left to tie it before the break.
“Moshannon Valley is certainly a much improved team but our guys need to step up. We have a much deeper team this year with more balance but we just didn’t make our shots.”
Perhaps the deciding blow came early in the third quarter when Curwensville’s Trey Rauckhorst, a 6’ 4” senior, picked up his fourth foul with 7:18 still on the clock.
The Knight’s took full advantage of Rauckhorst going to the Curwensville bench, outscoring the Tide 17-8 to take a 37-28 lead into the final frame.
Curwensville would get to within seven of Moshannon Valley twice in the final eight minutes but could not get any closer as the Knights out pointed the Tide in the period 14-13.
Rauckhorst paced the Golden Tide with 10 points while Neff with 17 and Dillon Houck with 11 led Moshannon Valley.
In the junior varsity contest it was Curwensville winning easily, 44-9, over the young Black Knights.
Curwensville returns to the hardwood on Monday night with another road trip. The Tide travel to Brockway to play the Rovers with junior varsity action beginning at 6 pm.
CURWENSVILLE – 41
Jake Terry 3 0-0 7, Jonathan Miller 0 1-6 1, Trey Rauckhorst 4 2-4 10, Noah Strickland 0 0-0 0, Harrison Bloom 1 0-2 2, Quamone Newkirk 3 0-0 8, Curtis Linsenbigler 0 0-0 0, Alex Hill 1 2-2 4, R. J. Olson 4 1-1 9, Zach Marshall 0 0-0 0, Dillon Davis 0 0-0 0, TOTALS – 16 6-15 41
MOSHANNON VALLEY – 51
Curtis Neff 8 1-3 17, Dillon Houck 2 6-7 11, Sam Demko 2 0-0 6, Jake Murawski 3 3-4 9, Connor Holobinko 2 4-13 8, Jacob Stanton 0 0-0 0, Nick Kitko 0 0-0 0, TOTALS – 17 14-27 51
SCORE BY QUARTERS:
CURWENSVILLE 7 13 8 13 41
MOSHANNON VALLEY 10 10 17 14 51
THREE-POINTERS: Newkirk 2, Terry, Demko 2, Houck
OFFICIALS: Al Crice, Frank Swago, Gene Parker
Golden Tide Scoreboard:
Date Opponent Score Record 12/05 @ Mo Valley 41 – 51 0 – 1 12/08 @ Brockway 12/10 HARMONY 12/12 RIDGWAY 12/15 CLEARFIELD 12/16 WEST BRANCH 12/19 KANE 01/02 @ DuBois Central Catholic 01/06 JOHNSONBURG 01/09 MO VALLEY 01/14 ELK COUNTY CATHOLIC 01/16 GLENDALE 01/19 @ West Branch 01/20 @ Ridgway 01/23 BROCKWAY 01/26 DUBOIS CENTRAL CATH 01/28 @ Harmony 01/30 @ Johnsonburg 02/02 @ Glendale 02/03 SHEFFIELD 02/06 @ Kane 02/09 @ Clearfield