Poland survives Warriors, 72-71

The unbeaten Bulldogs advanced to the regional for a second straight year.

By JOHN BASSETTI

VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF

BOARDMAN — The road to the regional that was supposed to go through Poland still does, but it almost took a detour through Beloit.

It wasn’t until time ran out following Matt Tafe’s free throw and Alex Stull’s follow-up basket for West Branch that the Poland boys sealed the Division II district championship at Boardman High Saturday night, 72-71.

Make that the undefeated Poland boys; and make that the gutsy West Branch Warriors.

After 22 games of mostly blowout victories, Poland (23-0) met its match at the district level.

West Branch stayed close, then fell behind by 16 before giving Poland all it could handle.

But Poland, an above-average team, shifted its multi-faceted machine into a higher gear.

An average team wouldn’t have escaped West Branch’s near-comeback.

An average team wouldn’t have survived losing one of its second-shift players with a dislocated finger early in the game.

An average team wouldn’t have been 11 of 34 from 3-point range.

Then there’s West Branch, an above-average underdog, which wouldn’t have successfully pierced Poland’s full-court pressure, which wouldn’t have thrown and bounced the ball with precision and out-rebounded the Bulldogs, 43-38.

In the end, West Branch (14-10) challenged Poland unlike almost any team this season. Before Saturday, the Bulldogs won most of their games by 30 points. Only Boardman was closest: 82-80.

“I give coach [Mike] Falasca and his staff all the credit in the world,” Ken Grisdale said of the Warriors. “They play a pretty good schedule in the Northeastern Buckeye Conference. We scrimmaged them in the summer and we scrimmaged them in the fall, so they know how to play us and they did a nice job with it.”

Although West Branch had 24 turnovers to Poland’s 17, Grisdale wasn’t convinced that his Bulldogs seriously disrupted the opponent. However, holding the Warriors to eight points in the third quarter wasn’t inordinate for Poland, a team returning to the regional for a second straight year.

Ben Donlow wasn’t in the flow early, but Grisdale blamed it on lack of rebounding.

“We weren’t going to the glass,” Grisdale said. “The biggest complaint I had the first half was that we were getting shots off, but we weren’t getting the subsequent rebounds. We did the second half. We need Donlow to get involved in the game that way — on the glass first and then work his way out. I think he was going the other way to start. But he’s a sophomore and hasn’t been in this situation before.”

Donlow finished with a team-high eight rebounds, while Ben Umble grabbed seven.

Umbel and Anthony DeFelice had 20 points apiece for the winners, while Stull had 16 points for West Branch, followed by Vic Pappas and Trent Woods with 15 apiece.

Bryan Kosec dislocated a finger early in the game, but had it popped back into place. He won’t need surgery, and may even be ready for Thursday’s game against Lake Perry at the Canton Civic Center at 8 p.m.

Umbel was having some uncharacteristic ballhandling problems, but they didn’t last.

“Sometimes, he tries to shoulder a lot of it, which means he’s going to do a little more than he needs to,” Grisdale said. “But he’s the leader and puts a lot of hours in and he wants to keep playing and I don’t blame him.”

Umbel and DeFelice also had four assists apiece.

Aside from a 16-2 run, Grisdale said that Poland didn’t have any major spurts like it usually does, but it may have been due to the Bulldogs’ 66-50 lead and the circumstances created by Kosec’s situation.

“We did something a little uncharacteristic when we went into a delay a little bit because they had six fouls and the next foul we were going to shoot some free throws. That took us out of our tempo, but it was something I thought we should do because our rotations were kind of messed up with Kosec gone and we had foul trouble. But those are things we’ve got to deal with, which will only make us stronger for the tournament down the road.”

West Branch hit 16 of 29 field goals in the first half and 28 of 57 for the game.

“We’re capable of knocking down shots,” coach Falasca said. “Then I thought the kids did a really good job of finding cutters when we were not making shots. Then Poland adjusted.”

Falasca talked about the lessons learned from the preseason scrimmages against Poland.

“We mentioned a few things to our kids as far as spacing and coming back to the ball and just to continue to attack,” he said. “Our biggest concern was that we wouldn’t be able to rebound, but, after the first 10 minutes of the game, we put that to rest. In the second quarter, I think we outscored them, 16-14, and we felt pretty confident that we’d be able to score and move the ball.”

Stull finished with a game-high 12 rebounds.

Falasca said that his Warriors got tired in the fourth quarter.

“Our guys played with so much heart, but they [Bulldogs] were subbing the whole game.”

bassetti@vindy.com