Mooney advances; Liberty ousted by Streetsboro, 72-45

By Greg Gulas

BOARDMAN — Donald D’Alesio’s jumper with 2.8 seconds remaining helped lift the Mooney High boys basketball team to a 45-43 victory over Lakeview Saturday in the Division II sectional final at the Boardman gymnasium.

In the nightcap, top-seeded Streetsboro tuned up for a district showdown with the Cardinals by walloping Liberty, 72-45.

Mooney and Streetsboro will meet Wednesday at 6 p.m. at the Boardman High gymnasium.

D’Alesio, who had a team high 13 points, said that he had practiced that particular shot during pregame warm-ups. So when it was time to execute the play that Mooney coach Chris Kohl diagrammed, he was ready.

“The play was meant to go for the tie with two guys up top setting a pick,” D’Alesio said. “Practicing that shot in pregame warm-ups helped, so when Coach actually called for the play everyone was ready to do their job.

“We lost to some teams this year that we shouldn’t have and didn’t finish a few other games, but we feel like we can play with anyone right now,” D’Alesio said.

“Give credit to the entire team because nobody quit,” D’Alesio said.

“It’s just a great feeling to now move on to district play.”

Leading 19-16 at halftime on the strength of a Jeff Chahine three-pointer as time was running out, the Cardinals (10-12) fell behind by a 33-31 count after three periods of play.

They retook the lead, 43-40, with 39 seconds remaining.

Lakeview’s Justin Clark canned a bucket from beyond the arc with just 23 ticks remaining.

That set the stage for D’Alesio’s game-winning bucket from just inside the three-point line.

“As an assistant coach at Struthers we had the good fortune of winning several sectional titles, but this feeling is a lot different,” Kohl said.

“Tonight’s win really means a lot to the players, the coaches and the entire program,” Kohl said. “Our kids hung tough all game, took away their three-point shot and had a great overall defensive effort.

‘You have to credit assistant coach Dave Petty for formulating an outstanding game plan,” Kohl said. “He scouted them, took us through some game film and helped prepare the guys in practice for what they should expect come game time,” he added.

Lakeview, who saw their seven-game wins streak fall by the wayside, finished the season 17-5.

“This was just a great high school basketball game,” Lakeview coach George Lanterman said. “It started a little slow, and at halftime we decided that we wanted to take the ball at them in the second half.

“Give Cardinal Mooney credit,” Lanterman said. “We challenged them and tried to slow them down.

“They screened a lot off the ball and made some big shots when they needed to while both teams challenged each other the entire night,” Lanterman said.

In the nightcap, the Rockets (19-2) proved why they are the top seed as they raced to a 29-6 first quarter advantage and never looked back.

Robert Wilson had 19 points and Rico Smith added 18 markers to pace the Rockets.

TaShawn Letlow had a team-high 12 points for the Leopards, who finished their season 9-13.