City of Basketball Love

Will Slover (@WillSlover31)
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As a team that has had to overcome a number of inconveniences to start their 2016-17 basketball season, Beaver Falls didn’t show any signs of letting these various dilemmas affect them as they rolled into Archbishop Wood for the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic and took on Father Judge in the second game of a quintuple header at the home of the Vikings.

Despite having practiced just three times this season due to the success of their football team, who took home the PIAA AAA State Championship just a week ago, and then finding out mid-morning for a 2:15 PM game that they would be playing at Archbishop Wood instead of taking on Bethlehem Catholic elsewhere, the Tigers escaped victorious as they defeated the Crusaders of Father Judge by a score of 62-55.

Coming out of the gate a little slow, Beaver Falls trailed by six at halftime, 35-29, but a little intermission was all they needed as they came out of the half hot and used their powerful second half to leave the City of Brotherly Love with a win under their belt.

“I just think we got our legs under us,” said Beaver Falls head coach Doug Biega. “We've had three practices. The football team won the state title last Saturday so we had Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday practices and then we came up here so I think our kids had heavy legs in the first half and they seemed to have caught their second win after last night’s game. I’d like to say we made some brilliant tactical adjustment but I just think we got our legs.”

Leading the way for Beaver Falls in the back end of this ball game was senior forward Josh Creach.

Creach, the 6-6 forward and Hutchinson Community College (Kan.) commit, finished with 22 points and a game-high of 11 rebounds.

“He’s our best player. As Josh goes, we go,” Biega said. “I just think his ability to go get the ball is his biggest strength. Off the glass, even when he posts up, his energy to go get it instead of letting it come to him, I think he played with a lot more energy in the fourth quarter.”

The fourth quarter, which is where Beaver Falls finally dug themselves out of the hole they had been in since late in the first quarter, was where Creach thrived as the big man scored 10 of his 22 while his team saw a two point deficit at the start of the frame turn into a seven point advantage by the time the buzzer sounded.

Creach’s stellar effort was aided by guards Torian Leak and Gage McKelvey, as the three combined to score 52 of Beaver Falls’ 62 points.

McKelvey, who scored 19 points, 15 of which came from beyond the arc, and also added in four rebounds and three assists, was the Tigers’ leading scorer in the first half as he scored 14 of his 19 in the first two frames of play.

Leak, on the other hand, has only been on the basketball court for a week after being a crucial player in his school’s state championship run, finished with 11 points for the contest.

Eight of those 11 points came in the game-changing third quarter which saw Beaver Falls trim a six point halftime deficit and trail by just two going into the fourth quarter.

“He’s a junior, this is his third year starting for us,” Biega said. “Like I said, he was on the football team five days ago so he’s playing his well into shape, through shin splints and some injuries. He’s just a tough kid.”

For Father Judge, it was senior captain Marc Rodriguez who led the way.

Rodriguez, the 6-foot-2 guard, finished with a game-high of 29 points, and was aided by fellow guard Matt O’Connor, who was the only other Crusader to reach double digits as he finished with 10 points, while also adding in five rebounds and three assists.

Although Rodriguez was the star of the show for Judge, Beaver Falls adjusted their strategy and made it hard for the sharpshooter to stay hot for all four quarters as he scored 27 of his 29 in the first three quarters, but couldn’t get anything going in the fourth quarter, where his team saw their lead slip away.

“He’s a great basketball player,” Biega said. “We put our smaller guy on him. Last night, someone made an adjustment on Josh and put a smaller guy on him and it seemed to bother him in his space so we tried that on him and it worked.”

Beaver Falls will look to use the upcoming days to get more into a swing of things as their most recent (and only) week of practice and game relocations has been a bit of mayhem for the squad who hails from just outside of Pittsburgh.

“It wasn't ideal but I wouldn't say it threw us off because we really weren’t prepared to play Bethlehem Catholic, we didn’t know who they were either,” Biega said. It’s not like we came in with a good game plan. Like I said, we’re treating these games like scrimmages because we’ve only had three practices.”