By Greg Reedy
Sports Editor
After a strong start, Johnsonburg held on to defeat Ridgway 53-45 in action last night at Ridgway Area High School in front of a standing room only crowd.
Johnsonburg coach Bill Shuey said he was impressed with the atmosphere the fans brought to the game.
"The environment was great," Shuey said. "I thought Ridgway did a nice job of getting crowd involvement, students involved with their tailgate and their whiteout, it was a fun experience for all."
With the game tied 4-all midway through the first quarter, Johnsonburg (8-5) went on a 10-0 run to take a 14-4 lead after the opening period. Playing a half-court style, the Rams were able to execute well on offense and frustrate Ridgway's offense.
"They didn't penetrate as much and when they did, our help defense was OK," Shuey said. "It wasn't the best, we still let them get fairly close to the rim. They didn't get second shots. I thought we controlled the boards very well in the first half."
Ridgway coach Anthony Allegretto said missed shots hurt early in the game.
"We also missed a lot of shots at the beginning," Allegretto said. "It was nice to see everyone come out and support us like this. The kids played hard and coach Shuey did a great job. He came out and had a gameplan to pound the ball inside. That's what they did with Matt and Matt's a heck of a player."
The Rams built the lead to 20-4 2:20 into the second quarter until the Elkers (8-7) began to chip away at the 16-point lead. The Elkers outscored Johnsonburg 9-4 in the rest of the quarter and trailed by 11 at halftime, 24-13. Allegreto said the Elkers did not execute a gameplan of being an aggressive, fast team.
"We were trying to press, we want to turn the game and make it up-tempo," Allegretto said. "For some reason, our guys, I'm thinking it's just understanding, they haven't done it enough, they don't exactly understand what I want, but they seemed to figure it out in the second quarter. At halftime, I said 'This is what we want, we want to take chances, we want to gamble, we want to force bad passes.' If we do it right, we'll have help behind the traps and we got much better at it. Hopefully, the light bulb went off for them and they realized we're a better team when we play up-tempo. They don't want to do it."
Allegretto said by playing a halfcourt style in the first half, Ridgway actually aided what the Rams wanted to do.
"They look for the perfect trap, they look for the perfect run and jump," Allegretto said. "It's not always there, sometimes you have to force the issue. Once we started forcing the issue a little bit, we created some turnovers. Their advantage was in the post and by playing halfcourt, we let them have that advantage. The gameplan was not to play halfcourt, it was to force the issue and about halfway through the second period, they started to do that."
Johnsonburg led by 15 at one point early in the third quarter until Ridgway began to make a charge. A 12-2 run for the Elkers was capped by a Ben Jaques 3-pointer to cut the Rams' lead to 31-26 with 2:46 left in the third quarter.
"I think in the second half we started watching the ball," Shuey said. "They got some second shots on the weak side. On the boards, we weren't boxing out. That gave them some second and third looks at the hoop."
Johnsonburg led 33-28 entering the final quarter. Shuey said building a lead into the end of the game was important to the victory.
"We didn't have that big a lead to even feel comfortable with as good a shooting team as Ridgway is," Shuey said. "Then we got rattled with their pressure and turned the ball over too many times in the second half. We did give them an opportunity, if it wasn't for that stretch when we settled down on the offensive end, got the ball inside a couple times, got some good looks, made some baskets. If we wouldn't have done that and built that little lead going into the fourth, we would have been in trouble."
Johnsonburg maintained the five-point lead early in the fourth quarter until a 9-0 Rams' run seemingly put the game away with a 46-32 lead at the 2:31 mark of the final period. The Rams led 46-36 with one minute left when Ridgway's shooting began to catch fire. Eric Matheson nailed two 3-pointers in a row to put the Elkers within six at 48-42 as Johnsonburg's foul shooting began to struggle. Jaques followed with a 3-point play to pull Ridgway within three with 30 seconds remaining. Shuey said Ridgway's shooting was phenomenal down the stretch.
"Their shooting down the stretch was unbelievable," Shuey said. "We wouldn't have guarded people that far out. The player that was guarding him (Matheson) says, 'I thought I was in trouble when he was pump-faking at halfcourt and then took two dribbles and shot it.'"
Allegretto said Matheson and the players played hard.
"He hit some big shots, made some big steals," Allegretto said. "The other guys were hustling, playing hard and getting deflections. Louie Stilwell played very well at the defensive end tonight, he made a big jump shot in the first half when we couldn't score. We're getting there. We're still a young team and we have to experience this type of heartache."
However, a technical foul on Ridgway gave two shots and the ball back to the Rams. Johnsonburg was able to close out the Elkers from the foul line to win by eight.
Matheson led the Elkers with 23 points. Matt Shuey had 17 points to lead Johnsonburg.
Ridgway travels to face Curwensville on Tuesday. Johnsonburg is at Sheffield on Tuesday.
Johnsonburg 14 10 9 20 - 53
Ridgway 4 9 15 17 - 45
Johnsonburg - 53
Matt Shuey 7 3-5 17, Aaron Patrick 5 3-5 13, Joe Holmberg 5 1-2 12, Louie Imbrogno 2 1-4 6, Koty Gorske 1 1-3 3, Seth Weible 1 0-0 2, Totals 21 9-19 53.
Ridgway - 45
Eric Matheson 10 1-1 23, Ben Jaques 3 1-3 9, Jordan Lundin 1 3-4 5, Dom Aiello 0 2-2 2, Alex Oknefski 0 2-4 2, Aaron Sorge 1 0-0 2, Totals 15 9-14 45.
3-pointers: Johnsonburg 2 (Holmberg 1, Imbrogno 1), Ridgway 4 (Matheson 2, Jaques 2).
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