RICHMOND — Still basking in the glow of Friday’s stunning win over Forest Hills, the Richmond boys’ basketball team had to recharge its batteries for another challenge Tuesday.
The Bobcats faced a young Rangeley club and did so without the shooting prowess it displayed in the win over the Tigers.
Richmond overcame some early struggles before pulling away for a 49-28 win.
“We talked about it many times since that night,” Richmond coach Jon Spear said. “We can’t let our intensity down. Even though we practice for it, I think we did a little bit. We talked about it at halftime and I think we came out a little more intense in the second half. We’ve seen the intensity that we need to have at every game and anything less is unacceptable at this point.”
Richmond defeated Forest Hills 56-47 last week, aided by six 3s in the first half and some clutch shooting down the stretch. The Bobcats didn’t have that shooting touch Tuesday, and a young Rangeley club was able to hang around until Richmond broke the game open in the third.
“We’re really thin on the bench,” said Rangeley coach Jeff Larochelle, whose team has just one senior and one junior and three eighth graders. “We’re young and we just kept turning the ball over. That takes us out of the game because we’re not getting shots. Then being so young, it kind of gets upstairs and we stop playing.”
The Lakers even lost two players to injury during the game. Senior Michael Haley was hit in the head and left the game early in the second half. Then sophomore Tim White hurt his ankle in the final minute.
White finished with 13 for the Lakers (2-8). Wyatt Dellavalle added seven. Richmond (6-4) got eight each from Cam Emmons, Sean Bernier and Bailey Johansen and seven from Matt Holt.
Rangeley’s zone gave the Bobcats some trouble early and the result was some sporadic play from Richmond. The Bobcats built a 10-point lead, but couldn’t hold it.
Rangeley got a pair of baskets from White late in the quarter to make it 14-6. The Lakers, which had 11 turnovers in the first half, were within five points twice and four once in the second. White hit a 3 and then hit a jumper to keep the Lakers close. His free throw with 2:27 left in the half made it 19-15. Richmond got a three-point play from Tyler Soucy that led to a 22-16 lead at the half.
“We wanted to make sure we maintained the lead,” said Spear. “We didn’t feel like we were playing our best. Our shots definitely weren’t falling like they did the other night. They’re not always going to. So we just tried to ride it out and play good defense, make sure we get the rebounds and bring it back down for another chance.”
The Lakers began to wear down in the third. Rangeley had 22 turnovers in the second half and shot 4-for-15 in the half. That was after starting 0-for-5 in the third and 0-for-4 in the fourth.
“I keep telling my kids to play the minutes” Larochelle said. “Even if we’re down by 2o, we want to finish the quarter. If we score 12 and they score 12, that’s good. We don’t want being down by 20 turning into being down by 30.”
Richmond got back-t0-back baskets by Johansen to start a 9-0 run that opened the third. Emmons hit a 3 and Cody Tribbet scored on the baseline for a 31-16 lead.
Rangeley didn’t get its first basket of the quarter until a Dellavalle three-point play with 2:48 remained.
The lead was up to 37-23 after three, and Richmond used a 11-4 surge in the fourth to finish it off. Rangeley was held to just one field goal in the quarter.
“I’m playing sophomores and freshmen,” Larochelle said. “If we can get them playing six to eight minutes here and there with some of these guys, that’s good. Then we’ll go into practice tomorrow and build on it.”
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