CLARION, Pa. (D9Sports) — Unselfish basketball helped Clarion knock off visiting Clarion-Limestone, 69-56, and gain a share of the KSAC North title Wednesday night.
(Photo of Clarion’s Austin Hummell, the Hager Paving Player of the Game)
“We looked and played as a complete team on offense,” Clarion head coach Jess Quinn, whose team lost out on a chance to play in Friday’s KSAC Title Game because of a tiebreaker won by the Lions, said. “We played complete team defense. A couple of times, it stalled on us, and we had a couple of turnovers. But, I thought, for the most part, all of our guys looked for the open man.”
That wasn’t any more evident on than on the final play of the third quarter when Ryan Anthony hit a dagger of a 3-pointer that completed a quarter-ending 8-0 run for the Bobcats that put them up 10, 53-43, going into the fourth quarter.
After causing a turnover with 14 seconds to play, Clarion played for the last shot with the ball in the hands of point guard Cam Craig. Craig then dished to Ceventh Lynch-Skunda, who would have had a decent shot, but Lynch-Skunda saw Anthony in the left corner with even a better shot and gave up the rock to the senior, who nailed it in the final home game of his career.
“That is something I’m very proud of with Ceventh,” Quinn said. “That’s a big step. Everybody wants to be that hero. Everybody wants to that last shot. We talk about it all the time in practice. To me, it’s not about Ryan hitting that last shot, it was about Ceventh finding him by making that extra pass. Look at March Madness, you see those guys do it all the time. We talked about it tonight. That’s why I give Ceventh the most absolute amount of credit in the world because he found a teammate who knocked it down. And then, his excitement was incredible. He fed off it defensively.”
Defense was the name of the game during the game-deciding run that went to 10-0 on an Austin Hummell basket at the start of the fourth quarter. Clarion forced five straight C-L turnovers turning them into eight points.
“We were just sloppy the whole night overall,” C-L head coach Joe Ferguson said. “They were trapping, but I don’t even know what to say. We weren’t very good tonight. We played just like we played at the (West Shamokin) Christmas Tournament (when the Lions lost two of their five games on the season). I didn’t know how to get them out of it. We didn’t really make it a game. I give Clarion credit, they outplayed us and outhustled us.”
Quinn believes the team approach to the pressure defense played a big role in the C-L mistakes.
“The fact they didn’t realize when (the press) was going to come or where it was coming from played a role,” Quinn said. “We got with the two closest men (to the ball). When they put their head down to start dribbling, we spring it. They key to that is that every other guy on the court rotated. In the past couple of games, we hadn’t rotated. Tonight, we rotated well and got those key steal to kind of prop that lead up.”
The pressure and the run couldn’t have come at a better time for Clarion.
After leading by two at halftime, 29-27, the Bobcats quickly scored the first six points of the second half to go up eight, 35-27, on a fastbreak basket by Spencer Miller 1:32 into the half, and Clarion still led by eight, 40-32, after a Craig hoop with 3:51 left in the third quarter.
But C-L quietly chipped away the lead using an 11-5 spurt to cut the deficit two, 45-43, on a Sam Leadbetter basket off a Dan Callen pass with 1:34 left in the third quarter.
A Ty Burford free throw made it 46-43, and then Clarion’s defense turned it up a notch forcing three straight turnovers and turning them into a pair of Lynch-Skunda baskets and Reed Anthony’s triple.
Then Hummell scored five fourth-quarter points on his way to a team-high 16 to keep the Lions at bay.
Hummell, the Hager Paving Player of the Game, talked about the win.
Dan Callen paced C-L with 30 points.
Because of the result, C-L drops into the fourth seed in the upcoming District 9 Class 2A playoffs where it will need to play Clarion again at a date, time and neutral site to be determined. That also puts the Lions on the same side of the bracket as top-seeded and favorite Coudersport. It also means Keystone moves up to the third seed and will face Brockway in the quarterfinals.
“I think the loss tonight is hopefully a wake-up call,” Ferguson said. “We get one day to work on things I feel we can work on and correct (before the KSAC title game with Keystone Friday). It comes down more to focus. They have to understand you can’t come in and play a one-man game. We didn’t play team ball. We will work on that tomorrow to get ready for Friday. I have the confidence that we will refocus. I don’t think we were mentally prepared tonight. Sometimes you take a loss, and it wakes you up. You can take this loss as a positive.”
CLARION 69, CLARION-LIMESTONE 56
Score by Quarters
Clar.-Limestone 13 14 16 13 — 56
Clarion 15 14 24 16 — 69
CLARION-LIMESTONE — 56
Deion Deas 1 0-0 2, Julian Laugand 2 5-5 9, Sam Leadbetter 1 0-0 2, Ian Callen 2 2-2 6, Kyle Kerle 1 0-0 2, Christian Smith 2 0-0 5, Mac Park 0 0-0 0, Dan Callen 13 4-6 30. Totals 22 11-13 56.
CLARION — 69
Ty Burford 4 6-8 14, Cam Craig 5 2-3 13, Reed Anthony 1 1-2 3, Spencer Miller 2 3-5 7, Austin Hummell 6 4-8 16, Ceventh Lynch-Skunda 3 0-0 7, Ryan Anthony 3 0-0 7, Zak Bauer 1 1-2 3. Totals 25 17-28 69.
Three-pointers: C-L 1 (Smith). Clarion 2 (Ryan Anthony, Lynch-Skunda)
