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East Aurora uses big fourth quarter to stun Dunkirk, 59-55

OBSERVER Photo by Ron Szot Dunkirk’s Evon Hernandez (5) goes up for a shot between East Aurora’s Joe Montgomery and Nick Montgomery during Monday’s Section VI Class B1 semifinal game at Buffalo State.

BUFFALO — If anyone needed more proof of how up and down the Dunkirk boys basketball season has been during the 2016-17 campaign, all they needed to do was watch the No. 5 Marauders’ Section VI, Class B1 semifinal against No. 1 East Aurora (18-3) at Buffalo State.

Through the first three quarters, Dunkirk (13-10), which it has on the nights it has been at its best, dominated the top-seeded Blue Devils, outscoring East Aurora, 41-32. Then came the fourth quarter, which, in and of itself, was a microcosm of the Marauders’ “Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde” personality.

After a bucket by Cal McTigue cut the Marauders’ lead to 41-34, six-straight points put them up 47-34 with 6:19 remaining.

Then the tides began to turn, as East Aurora went to a pressure defense which stymied Dunkirk and helped lead the Blue Devils to a 25-8 game-changing run and a 59-55 come-from-behind win that left their fans in a frenzy and the Marauders’ faithful stunned.

“The great thing about it is, as a player, as a coach, you can easily put your chin down into your chest and just let (the other team) keep playing that way,” East Aurora head coach Chris Koselny said. “Or you can do things like dive on the floor, get loose balls, get deflections and I think that’s what we did. We started picking up the defensive pressure and we made hustle plays. We talk about playing with energy, enthusiasm and effort and that’s all it took in that last six or eight minutes to change the direction of the game.”

“We took some tough risks and continued to try and push the ball,” Dunkirk head coach Jack O’Brien said of the fourth quarter. “We weren’t going to try and slow it down, because that’s not the type of team we are, but unfortunately when the tide started turning the other way, those long passes went from layups to turnovers. And that’s what seemed to kill us at the end.”

Dunkirk maintained a 12-point lead with 5:13 remaining, getting a free-throw from Evon Hernandez to put the Marauders up 50-38, but from there, the Blue Devils went to work by using a full-court press to wreak havoc on the Marauders while creating shots and getting to the charity stripe on the offensive end.

“We’ve lost a few games this year and we can pick and choose the minutes in those games where we lost them,” Koselny said. “And it’s great to be able to pick and choose the minutes in this one where we won the game. Things weren’t going our way early, but it was great to see the minutes where we won this one. That’s the mark of a team that really wants to move forward.”

Koselny and his Blue Devils can look to the last five minutes of the fourth quarter as the minutes where they won the game. Or, where O’Brien and the Marauders can look to find the minutes where they lost the game they seemed to have control of through the first 27 minutes.

“We like to keep it moving and get the ball up the court and attack,” O’Brien said. “Sometimes that makes it tough when you’re trying to protect a lead. You get in that frame of mind where you’re watching the clock and as much as we tried to stay out of it, and keep going with what got us (the lead), it sneaks up on you when the other team gets a little more desperate and start jumping some passes that maybe they didn’t jump earlier in the game and then sometimes the easy looks turn into turnovers.”

“We haven’t run that a lot this year, but my kids responded,” Koselny said of his team’s full-court press in the fourth quarter. “We ran it well and forced (Dunkirk) into some tough situations and we were able to finish at the end.”

Still clinging to a six-point lead with 2:25 left, Dunkirk was unable to hold the Blue Devils down, as a basket by Noah Denz and a foul shot by Nick Montgomery got East Aurora to within a single point, 55-54, with :57.4 seconds left. Then a steal and a layup by Josh Denz and another by Owen Smith helped seal the deal as the Blue Devils found themselves up 58-55 with just over 10 seconds to play.

“I thought they dominated us on the offensive boards in the first half, but it didn’t kill us,” O’Brien said. “It’s not like we were giving them uncontested layups, and in the second half, I thought we did a much better job of boxing-out. But at the end of the game, we left a couple in our hands and we didn’t do a good job against the pressure and that’s what got to us.”

Dunkirk had its shot at a game-tying 3-pointer, but Shamon Stewart’s long attempt bounced off the front of the rim into the arms of Cal McTigue, who was fouled immediately. He hit one of his two attempts at the line for the 59-55 final.

For the first three quarters, it was all Dunkirk, as it held a 14-12 lead after the first quarter and a 30-23 lead at the break, thanks in large part to big shots by Hernandez, and Tyreek Buchanan-Ruiz, who combined for 21 of their team’s 30 first-half points.

“We fought all year and we’ve had different guys step up, so the scoring has been spread around,” O’Brien said. “We have plenty of guys who can put the ball in the basket. But it just got away from us.”

In the third, Devaun Farnham-DeJesus and Hernandez hit back-to-back treys to put Dunkirk up 36-23 with 6:11 left, before a 9-0 run by the Blue Devils cut the lead to, 36-32, with 2:58 remaining. A long 3-pointer by Darnell Butts, however, pushed Dunkirk’s lead back to seven, 39-32, before a bucket by Stewart gave the Marauders their nine-point advantage heading to the game’s final eight minutes.

“I give Dunkirk a lot of credit,” Koselny said. “They made shots. And we knew that’s what they were capable of, but they made shots and players made some shots that we didn’t expect to make shots. I give them a lot of credit. They were prepared and they’re a very good team — a very good team.”

However, from there, Dunkirk’s big-shot making ability seemed to go by the wayside as East Aurora began to ratchet up its pressure defense, leading the Blue Devils to a 27-14 advantage in the fourth quarter and a trip to the Section VI, Class B-1 final back at Buffalo State on Saturday at 1:45 p.m., where they will see either No. 3 Newfane or No. 2 MST Seneca.

As for Dunkirk, its the end of the line for seniors Hernandez, Stewart, Buchanan-Ruiz, and Seth Rasmus, a quartet that O’Brien knows he will dearly miss.

“I can’t say enough about those seniors,” O’Brien said. “They’re just a great bunch. And with the success they had in football, and we were right there tonight… We’ve been to Buffalo State two years in a row now, we just unfortunately haven’t got it done. But that still says a lot about those guys to get that done.”

The future is still bright, however, for Dunkirk, as it should return Farnham-DeJesus, Felix Garcia, Butts and Noah Sobilo — four players who saw significant time this year.

“That’s the plan,” O’Brien said when asked if he thought he might have enough talent coming back to return to Buffalo State for a third-straight year in 2017-18. “But we’ve got to work hard in the offseason. You don’t just get better because you get older. I’m kind of learning that the hard way. This is such a crazy time, so it’s kind of hard to think about (next year). We hope we can get the participation in the offseason, get the accountability and the discipline that we need to be successful. It’s going to hurt to lose the leadership of these seniors for sure.”

NOTES: Nick Montgomery led all scorers with 24 points while Blue Devil teammate McTigue had 16… Buchanan-Ruiz had a team-high 17 points for Dunkirk while Hernandez chipped in 15 in his final high school game.

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