PHILIPSBURG — Never was there a more anticipated Mountain League opener for either the Clearfield Bison nor the Philipsburg-Osceola Mounties than what the Philipsburg Gymnasium had in store Wednesday night. Clearfield was coming off a season of another District 9 championship, while the Mounties were coming off a year that saw them make the playoffs, and win their first post-season game in over a quarter century.
The packed, loud, and passionate crowd got a game that saw large leads, tight battles, and desire of one team to battle back late. In the end, somehow, the Bison came away with a 53-49 victory that very easily could have gone the other way.
“TJ (Anderson) is an excellent coach. His team is so well prepared, and they absolutely did not quit,” Clearfield head coach Nate Glunt said afterwards. “We had to work for it, because it certainly wasn’t easy.”
That was not even near an understatement as both teams would seemingly answer shot-for-shot in the opening quarter. After the Mounties struck first with a Jacob Desimone jumper, right afterwards Clearfield’s Andon Greslick got an open look at the baseline for a long three-pointer. P-O answered back, and it was near a repeat for the entire first eight minutes. So much so, the two squads were knotted up at 13 points each, with no one having a clear advantage.
The second quarter belonged to Clearfield, as they were living behind the arc, and took advantage of it.
The Bison hit five of their 10 treys in the quarter, three from Greslick, who finished with a team-high 17 points, plus one each from Cole Miller and Braison Patrick. Those shots allowed Clearfield to go into the locker room with a 32-23 lead, and possession with the ball to start the third quarter.
Greslick was one of three Bison in double figures, with Miller adding in 14 points and Patrick accounting for another 10. Miller also added in eight rebounds.
“Our first game out the gate, not bad. We do have some things to work on,” P-O’s Anderson said afterwards. “When you have someone that’s hitting five three’s in the first half, we need to recognize that we have to take that away, and take that away earlier.”
The Mounties responded in the third quarter, as they would keep the deficit within distance, matching the Bison in points and keeping Clearfield guessing.
For the Bison, the struggles that eluded them through the first three quarters began to show up in the final eight minutes. After giving up only six turnovers in the first half, the Bison squad began having issues holding onto the ball, whether going out of bounds or having the ball stolen on a bad pass. At the same time, P-O was getting aggressive on the boards, out-rebounding Clearfield in the final quarter, 11-7.
“We simply didn’t play fundamental basketball. We had maybe six turnovers in a matter of three minutes, but we absolutely lost the battle on the glass,” Glunt said.
That allowed the Mounties to reel in the opposition, with a gap going from at one point of 11 points to seven, then five, and soon it was one possession with under two minutes remaining.
P-O had to play tough, but smart, as both Camden Mason and Nick Johnson each had four fouls to their tally, and did they just that as they got chances at the foul line to crawl back into the game. Late in the going, with Clearfield only up by three, Zack Meyers managed to put one of his free throws in the net, pulling the Mounties to a single possession. On the opposing end of the court, Morgen Billotte would get fouled with five seconds remaining and put both of his foul shots in to increase the lead to four points. Clearfield took its final timeout to set up for what would be likely the final possession.
On the inbound pass, P-O looked deep, but could not find an opening. The pass went laterally, as the ball had yet to go in possession on the court. After finally getting the ball in, the Mounties looked for a deep three plus the foul to tie the game, but as the ball left the hands of Colby Hahn, the buzzer sounded, and suddenly the sidelines, coaches, and even some of the statisticians on the P-O side were going berserk, stating the clock should have never started when it did since the initial pass was not on forward into the court of play.
By then, the officials were already heading to their locker room, and rather than fight it and possibly costing his team for their next game, Anderson instead tried to keep his team and coaching staff at ease. Although the loss stung a bit, Anderson could see his team had a lot of grit, and desire. He actually was already looking towards the second act between the two squads.
“What we don’t realize, yet, is this is just part one. Part two is coming up soon,” Anderson said.
P-O did manage to get the win in the opening junior varsity contest, 33-27.
The Mounties put a pair of players in double figures with Desimone leading all scoring with 19 points, and Johnson adding in 11.
For the Bison (2-0), having the first game of their league play be such a tough opponent, in a tough environment, tested the team in every aspect of the game. When asked if these kind of games caused anxiety, Glunt could only laugh, saying, “I’ve had anxiety all week leading into tonight. So, yes, but also these are the games we enjoy playing in.”
Clearfield is not done with road trips for the week, as they will travel to Punxsutawney on Friday night.
SCORE BY QUARTER
Clearfield 13 19 8 13 – 53
Philipsburg-Osceola 13 10 8 18 – 49
Clearfield – 53
Luke Pallo 0 1-2 1, Kam Kushner 0 0-0 0, Kai Lynch 0 0-0 0, Braison Patrick 3 1-5 10, Andon Greslick 6 0-0 17, Anthony Lopez 1 0-0 3, Morgen Billotte 2 4-4 8, Cole Miller 5 3-3 14. TOTALS 17 9-14 53.
Philipsburg-Osceola – 49
Oliver Harpster 1 4-6 6, Lucas Peterson 1 0-0 2, Nick Johnson 4 3-4 11, Zack Meyers 0 1-2 1, Jacob Desimone 8 2-2 19, Camden Mason 3 0-2 6, Colby Hahn 1 0-0 2, Logan Phillippi 0 0-0 0, Ryan McClure 0 0-0 0. TOTALS 19 10-16 49.
GAME STATISTICS
Clearfield/P-O
- Shooting: 17-52/18-42
- Rebounds: 23/29
- Fouls: 15/16
- Turnovers: 17/15
- Three-Point Shots: Patrick-3, Greslick-5, Miller, Lopez/Desimone
- Sideline Infraction: Clearfield (4:01 Q1)