RUMFORD – Their coach wasn’t happy with how they finished in their season opener on Tuesday, so Mountain Valley decided to finish things early in Thursday’s home opener.
The Falcons outscored Jay 23-4 in the second quarter and cruised to a 57-30 win at Puiia Gymnasium.
Andy Shorey posted game highs in points and rebounds with a 19 point, 13-board performance and added three steals. Travis Fergola, Marcus Palmer and D.J. Gerrish provided balance with eight points apiece. Brandon DeMillo led the Tigers with 10 points and six rebounds, while Brad Loon added seven points.
Mountain Valley (2-0) spent the first quarter trying to solve Jay’s zone defense with outside shots that just wouldn’t fall (5-for-14 in the period. The Tigers (0-3) came out attacking the Falcons’ man-to-man to take an early 8-6 lead.
“I don’t know why we started off so slow,” said Mountain Valley coach Dave Gerrish. “We couldn’t get into any kind of rhythm.
“We missed some shots, and of course, they transitioned out of that.”
Shorey finally got the Falcons untracked with a pair of 3-pointers sandwiched around the quarter break. They then used good interior passing by Shorey (three assists) and Fergola (four assists) to teammates slashing through the paint to go on an 18-0 run and pull away.
“We wanted to break down their zone a little bit and get inside and we did that well,” Gerrish said. “We started creating a few turnovers out front and that was enough to get us by.”
Shorey set up along the baseline just below the block and spotted Fergola in the middle for the hoop that put the lead into double digits for good at 21-10. Shorey later found Brett Archibald underneath for another field goal that made it 29-10.
The Falcons made 10-of-14 shots in the quarter and led 35-12 at the half.
Archibald (six points, six rebounds) provided a nice spark off the bench, along with Byron Glaus (six points) and Dean McCrillis.
“We’re still not finishing that well right now,” Gerrish said. “When we start finishing well, we can play better defense. We’ll get there I think.”
Jay coach Frank Williams, whose team brought back just one starter from last year, was pleased to see his team maintain its defensive intensity despite the rough second period and Mountain Valley’s overall depth.
“Three of the four quarters, it was a nine-point game. The second half, it was a five-point game. I’m real pleased with that,” Williams said. “We went deep and really worked hard on defense.
“We didn’t score a lot of points, but we played pretty good defense all night except for that second quarter.”
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