Leechburg boys handle Riverview, advance to tourney final

By: HSSN Staff
Thursday, December 27, 2018 | 10:54 PM

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A “lackadaisical” practice coming out of the holiday break worried Leechburg boys basketball coach Corey Smith, but the Blue Devils showed plenty of energy a day later.

Leechburg used a fast pace and a balanced effort to run to a 72-62 victory over Riverview on Thursday in the opening game of the Apollo Trust Holiday Tournament at Apollo-Ridge.

“I said, ‘Let’s get it out and go,’ ” Smith said. “I knew we were a little bigger than them, so we could get out and go. I thought we rebounded well. We played Leechburg basketball.”

Four players scored in double figures for Leechburg (6-2), which continued its strong start and advanced to the tournament championship game for the second consecutive season. The Blue Devils will play Apollo-Ridge/Sharpsburg for the title Friday.

“It’s a big win against Riverview,” sophomore point guard Dylan Cook said. “They were tough. They were rolling coming into this game, and we knew their confidence was high. We knew we had to get back to the championship, where we left it off last year here.”

The Blue Devils overcame a solid effort from Riverview (4-2), which got a game-high 31 points from Noah Black.

“Leechburg is coached well. They do a lot of interesting things,” Riverview coach Paul Sapotichne said. “Though I thought we were prepared for them, they continued to do things that are difficult to guard. I’m not the kind of guy that gets excited when we lose, but clearly we are a better basketball team than we have been. We’ve still got a long ways to go, but I was pleased with our effort and some things that happened during the game.”

Smith said Wednesday’s practice worried him, but the only up-and-down part of Leechburg’s game Thursday was the pace.

With Smith exhorting his team to run as much as possible, the Blue Devils got out in transition and benefited from a red-hot shooting performance by Connor McDermott, who hit six 3-pointers and finished with 18 points — 15 in the first half.

When Riverview focused more of its defensive attention on McDermott in the second half, the Blue Devils’ other scorers came through. Jake Blumer and John Miskinis finished with 15 points apiece, and Cook added 14 as Leechburg spread the ball around.

“Connor knows all eyes are going to be on him,” Smith said. “Everyone reads the paper and sees he’s a shooter. If they have film on us, they see he’s a shooter. For Connor to get off, if he gets off, that’s good for us because we know it’s going to open up for everybody else.”

Leechburg never trailed, but Riverview kept it close throughout the first half. The Blue Devils led 20-18 after the first quarter and used a late 5-0 run to extend their advantage to 36-26 at halftime.

Black had 16 of Riverview’s 26 first-half points, keeping the Raiders in the game.

“He can shoot the basketball, there’s no question,” Sapotichne said. “He’s one of our captains, he’s been around for a while. The kids know he can shoot, so they get him the basketball, and that’s what a team does. We have some guys that can rebound and score inside, but Noah’s the one and I thought Gideon (Deasy) got him the ball often in good shooting situations.”

Riverview trimmed Leechburg’s lead to seven points late in the third quarter, but the Blue Devils responded with an 11-0 run to enter the fourth with a 55-37 lead, their biggest of the night.

Black scored 10 points in the fourth quarter, and the Raiders twice made it an eight-point game in the final minute, but Cook made five of six free-throw attempts to seal the victory.

“I was worried coming into this game today because Riverview had one loss coming into the game and they were on a hot streak,” Smith said. “Coach Sapotichne’s doing a great job there, but we came out and weathered the storm in the beginning and played Leechburg basketball.”

Doug Gulasy is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Doug at dgulasy@tribweb.com or via Twitter @dgulasy_Trib.

Tags: Leechburg, Riverview