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North Canton Hoover outnumbers Mooney
YOUNGSTOWN — Some numbers were thrown out before the North Canton Hoover-Cardinal Mooney boys basketball game Friday night – like 1,600, 625, 0.
The first figure is Hoover’s enrollment, the second is Mooney’s enrollment and 0 is the number of times the teams previously met.
But the only numbers that counted were those in Hoover’s lopsided 81-49 victory in a game of teams that entered with identical records.
“They’re one of the premier teams in the Federal League and we saw that tonight,” Mooney coach Chris Kohl said after the Vikings (16-4) dominated from start to finish and benefited from Mooney’s 19 turnovers.
“Coach [Randy] Montgomery has that wide style that features the back cut and they do a very good job,” Kohl said of the Hoover coach’s team that produced points by either pushing the ball down court or efficiently working its offense otherwise.
“It reminds me of the old Sharon Kennedy teams that used to run that from across the foul line — if the guy’s overplaying, you go back door,” Kohl said.
Montgomery concurred.
“We have a good inside-outside game. We run a little bit of four-corners and a little bit of what we call ‘cutter’ when guys are dribbling and pitching or penetrate-and-pitch.”
Integral to the success of the offense were Cory Veldhuizen and Tyler Fausnight, who combined for 30 points.
“They’re not big, but they’re agile and hard to guard,” Montgomery said of the pair.
Dan Daugherty and Nyles Evans combined for another 29 points for Hoover, which was 33 of 52 from the field.
For Mooney, Jeff Chahine scored 12 points and Ryan Gallagher 10, while Gallagher had seven of his team’s 16 rebounds.
Actually, Hoover had the size advantage.
“We knew Veldhuizen was a real nice player inside and out and we tried our best to stop him, but our best wasn’t good enough tonight,” Kohl said.
“It was probably our worst game of the year,” said Kohl, who noted that his Cardinals (15-5) were 5-4 against Div. I teams this season.
“Of all the Div. I teams we’ve played, this is the best one we’ve played. Hopefully, we can take this loss and build upon it and get ready for the tournament. We think we can go far at Boardman,” Kohl said of the upcoming Div. II tournament.
“We told our guys that this is 1/20th of the season tonight, so, one game doesn’t make a season. We’ll come back and get ready for either Salem or Ravenna next Friday.”
Fausnight had seven of Hoover’s 27 rebounds and Daugherty had five assists for the Vikings, who open tournament play against Chaney on Wednesday.
Entering the game, Veldhuizen was Hoover’s top scorer (18.1 ppg.) and rebounder (7.4 rpg.).
Montgomery, a Salem native who played at YSU under Dom Rosselli before coaching at Wooster Triway, said that Hoover’s disruptive defense contributed to Mooney’s 21 of 55 field-goal shooting.
“They said they hadn’t seen our quickness or the kind of quickness we bring and we bring pretty good defensive intensity. Mooney is better than they look because they didn’t get good looks tonight. You could tell that if you let them get some looks and get comfortable with what they were doing, that they’d be able to convert and we knew that.”
Montgomery said a Hoover-Mooney series may be extended beyond its current home-and-home arrangement through next year.
“It may be something we’ll do back and forth.”
bassetti@vindy.com