Canfield endures and outscores Boardman

Gene Wollet scored a game-high 15 points to lead the Cardinals.

BOARDMAN — At a boys basketball game during which Rose Bowl-winning football coach Jim Tressel made an appearance, Canfield also came out smelling pretty good as the Cardinals outplayed Boardman, 50-39, in a non-league encounter.

Canfield (6-2) had a battered lineup, both before and after the game, with one player wearing a facemask, one getting medical attention for a foot in the face and the leading scorer not on the bench.

In the end, Canfield endured and outscored the Spartans (4-4) in the fourth quarter, 20-10, to prevail.

Despite sitting part of the first half with a nose injury from a foul, Canfield’s Gene Wollet had a game-high 15 points and Joe Hoelzel added 12, while Dave DiBernardi had 14 points for the Spartans.

“They’re awfully long for us and they have a lot of length,” Canfield coach John Cullen said of Boardman’s size, reach and range from such players as J.T. Moore, Chase Hammond, Dayne Hammond and DiBernardi.

“They body-up a bit and it’s hard to get easy looks,” Cullen said of the problems posed by Boardman’s physical advantage.

“We weren’t passing the ball very well early in the game, but as it went on, we passed well enough that they had to foul us a little bit. They’re averaging over 30 free throws a game, but tonight, we had 32 and they had 8. That’s the difference.”

Canfield sank 20 of 32 free throws to Boardman’s 3 of 8.

Cullen was also happy that the Cardinals rebounded as well as they did because, despite out-rebounding Canfield, 28-22, Justen Vrabel was king of the boards with 10 rebounds.

“He was a man among everybody,” Cullen said of his 6-2 senior heavyweight. “He knows that without Mike [Podolsky] out there, that he’s got to be the controlling force, both emotionally and physically. He’s part of that when Mike’s out there, but, tonight, he was either getting a finger on it or grabbing it outright.”

Podolsky was averaging 21.0 points per game before sitting out the last two games following an ejection.

On Tuesday, the Cardinals built their team around Vrabel.

Defensively, he’s our hub,” Cullen said. “He did all the tough stuff you need to do to stay in a game with a team like Boardman.”

Vrabel also had 13 points, while junior Ryan Abraham played with a mask which was protecting a jaw broken in two places, an injury sustained in the Lake game.

Wollet also had a big 3-pointer in the fourth quarter that put Canfield ahead, 42-37.

“He came back and had a nice second half and hit a big three-pointer,” Cullen said. “That was one of the big plays of the game.”

Boardman’s third-year coach Jim Goske said the 30-29 score after three quarters was a sign of Canfield dictating the tempo.

“I think that was the kind of game they wanted to have,” Goske said.

“That’s the kind of game [halfcourt] they play when they’re at their best. We didn’t want that tempo. We wanted the opposite — to get out and run up and down the floor and get a higher-scoring game. But that’s a credit to them — to control the game the way they wanted it.”

Boardman’s offense started to penetrate early in the fourth — attacking the rim and getting the ball in the low block where the Spartans thought they had an advantage, but then the push ended.

“Part of that,” Goske said, “is them [Canfield] and part of that is us, mentally, not doing what we’re supposed to be doing.”

The coach was asked to explain how — despite the rebounding effort of Moore and the Hammonds who had seven rebounds apiece — Canfield was as strong as it was defensively.

“They did a good job taking away the inside by doubled-down in the post a lot, especially in the first half,” Goske said. “They sagged back in and didn’t allow us to throw it in.”

He said that the Spartans wanted to establish an inside game, but Canfield executed its game plan and took it away.

“It was a little combination of both,” Goske said.

Canfield also beat Boardman last season, but Cullen isn’t taking anything for granted when playing the Spartans.

“If you don’t come out ready to play, they’ll hand it to you every time. It’s one of those Rt. 224 rivalries and we think this is a good team that gauges how we play big teams in the Federal League. That’s two Federal League wins in a row for us [GlenOak and Boardman], so that means we’re starting to make progress against those big D-ones. That’s what we want: to be better at the end of the season than we are now.”

Of Wollet’s nose injury, Abraham’s jaw and Podolsky’s absence, Cullen remarked: “It doesn’t hurt nearly as bad when you win.”