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Hot start leads boys past Tonawanda

The No. 10 Fredonia Hillbillies (7-14) opened the game on an 11-0 run Tuesday afternoon and never looked back as they got past No. 15 Tonawanda (4-17), 57-39, in Section VI Class B-1 first-round boys basketball action.

“It was very good, because it got a little nerve-racking down there at the end,” Fredonia head coach Greg Lauer said of the Hillbillies’ quick start to the first quarter. “We kind of took our foot off the gas pedal a little bit (in the second half) and our guys got complacent and (Tonawanda) was hitting shots and we weren’t, so thank goodness we got that big lead in the first half.”

Up by as many as 26 in the third quarter, Fredonia saw its lead drop to just 10 midway through the fourth quarter, but a big 3-pointer off an inbounds play by Nick Ruckman gave the home team a 45-32 lead, essentially putting an end to any thoughts the Warriors had of completing the comeback.

“That three was big for us,” Lauer said. “We called that out-of-bounds play for him to go out and get that shot, and he stepped up and hit it for us.”

From there, Fredonia emptied the bench to rest up its starters for tonight’s prequarterfinal game against No. 7 International Prep.

“It’s not easy,” Lauer said of having to play on back-to-back days. “I wanted to get more guys some rest (Tuesday), but we’re going to go and watch some film and get ready for (today).”

But the bench, which was comprised of a mixture of juniors, seniors and jayvee call-ups gave the Hillbillies exactly what they needed, helping to sew up yet another playoff win for the home team.

“I wanted to get them a decent amount of time (Tuesday),” Lauer said of his bench players. “And I wanted the jayvee players that we called up to get some varsity experience. Any time I can do that in a playoff game is good for them. And they finished strong. We were up 12 or 13 (when they entered the game) and we finished up (winning) by 18, so I was pleased with the way they finished the game.”

Andrew Field came off the bench to lead the Hillbillies with six of their 17 steals while sophomore call-up Brayden Myers hit three of his four free throws and Ka’Rim Levens and Owen Nicosia had a bucket apiece to help Fredonia to its 18-point win.

Despite being impressed with the 17 steals, Lauer was equally unimpressed that the turnovers did not lead to as many points as he would’ve hoped.

“With 17 steals, you think you should get 34 points and we didn’t do that (Tuesday),” Lauer said. “I thought we missed a lot of opportunities in transition on the steals. We’ve got to finish those. We were at 40 points with six minutes left in the game, so we’ve got to convert a lot more, especially against the city teams. If we can get steals and get buckets, then not get beat back on defense, it will help us out a great deal.”

Early in the game, however, those steals were turning into easy transition buckets as the home team jumped out to an 11-0 lead, before taking a 15-2 cushion into the second frame. Leading scorer Lucas Voss had six of those 15 points on a pair of 3-pointers that seemed to get the Hillbillies going in the right direction.

“Any time another team plays a zone (defense), we’re going to try and find him for shots,” Lauer said of Voss. “I don’t think we did a good enough job getting him enough shots (after the first quarter), but the next zone we see we’ll try to move him around a bit and get him a few more shots.”

Also helping was Ruckman, who punctuated that tone-setting run with a four-point play. He and the Hillbillies carried that momentum into the second where they outscored the Warriors 15-6 for a 30-8 halftime lead.

“He has the ability, at any time, to create good shots for himself and finish,” Lauer said of Ruckman. “And he had a big three to kind of put us up there (in the fourth quarter). He’s one of our main offensive guys.”

Reid Tarnowski added five of his 10 points on the night in the quarter while adding six rebounds, five assists and five steals throughout the rest of the game.

“He’s just progressing,” Lauer said of Tarnowski. “He’s getting tougher and tougher and he’s starting to lead the offense kind of like I’ve had with point guards in the past. So if he can start contributing and scoring for us, it’ll be a huge help.”

In the third, Fredonia’s lead ballooned to 26 two times, once on a bucket by Tarnowski and again on a layup by Nate Shuart, the Hillbillies’ little big man, who sat out most of the first half with a pair of fouls he picked up early in the first quarter.

“We really don’t have another post player after Nate,” Lauer said of Shuart, who is listed at a generous 6-feet on the Hillbillies’ official roster. “So when a team’s playing a zone (defense) and we can’t establish the inside, it’s the reason Lucas (Voss) wasn’t able to get the shots that he was getting (in the first half), because they didn’t really have to collapse down (on the post). So yeah, we really need Nate in the game. We can’t have him getting into any foul trouble moving forward.”

But after Shuart’s bucket put Fredonia up 40-14, Tonawanda was able to go on a run of its own, as it outscored the Hillbillies, 8-0 to end the third and 10-2 to start the fourth, cutting its deficit to 42-32 with 4:22 remaining in regulation.

“I just told them to start playing defense again,” Lauer said of his message to his team after the Warriors cut the Hillbillies’ lead from 26 to 10 in the fourth quarter. “We held them to eight point in the first half playing great help-side defense and then all of a sudden we were letting them drive to the hoop or leaving them open for threes just thinking we had the game in the bag and that just wasn’t the case. But we got the guys dialed back in, in the fourth quarter.”

Despite holding the Tonawanda to just eight points in the first half and 39 for the night, Lauer was still impressed with what the Warriors brought to the Fredonia High School gym Tuesday.

“They’re a very physical team,” Lauer said of Tonawanda. “And they shot the ball a lot better than I expected them to. They came here ready to try and win the game, but I think we really answered them down the stretch.”

It will be a quick turnaround for the Hillbillies, as they travel to Buffalo tonight to take on I-Prep (7-11) at 7 p.m. And with a win, Fredonia will be one step closer to getting back to a place it has become very familiar with over the past several years.

“They’re a city school that’s very athletic,” Lauer said of I-Prep. “They’ve got some size, but we’ve got a similar record to them and hopefully we can go and pull out the ‘W’ and then we’ll be a win away from playing at Buffalo State.”

NOTES: Shuart finished with 10 points and four rebounds… Ruckman added eight rebounds and three steals to go with his team-high 12 points…Voss had six assissts to go with his eight points… Nick Bitter led the Warriors with a game-high 15 points… Zach Stapf had 13 points while adding three assists in defeat… Charlie Moore led Tonawanda on the boards, hauling in a game-high 10 while chipping in six points.

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