Battle Mountain boys basketball uses full-court press to jump start rally over Vail Mountain School
Rex Keep/Courtesy photo
It was all Gore Rangers in the first half of Tuesday’s rivalry game between the Vail Mountain and Battle Mountain boys basketball teams.
The second told a different story, though.
“I’d describe it as a tale of two halves,” Vail Mountain coach Andrew Behrendt said after his team surrendered a 10-point first-half lead in losing to the Huskies 42-39 in Edwards. “I think we were the better team in the first half and they came storming back in the second 鈥� and it kind of came down to the wire.”
“To be able to come back from a deficit like that and collect themselves in the middle of the game 鈥� and rally back like that 鈥� I’m so happy for those boys,” Battle Mountain coach Rudy Ybarra said after his team completed the rally to protect its home court.
It was clear both teams wrote up good scouting reports going into the cross-county conflict, Ybarra said. The Huskies were forced into dribbling with their weak hands and struggled to find offensive flow throughout the first eight minutes as the Gore Rangers built a 10-6 lead.
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“(They) looked confident, collected and very calm on the defensive end and it helped them get more points on the offensive end, too,” Ybarra said.
Defense led to offense in the second quarter as well as Vail Mountain, ranked No. 13 in 2A, outscored its 5A opponent 16-10 in the second. Ybarra said he and his players went into the locker room looking for something in the toolbox to spark a run.
“We all asked each other, ‘what can we do differently to succeed here?,'” he said. “And we all agreed it was a full-court press we’d been practicing.”
The Gore Rangers managed the pressure well initially, even building their lead to 30-18 with 5:20 to go in the third quarter. But as fatigue set in, they struggled to initiate effective half-court offense coming out of the press break. Behrendt said he could tell his players felt “rushed and panicked a little bit.” To make matters worse, the Gore Rangers were just 2-for-10 from the free throw line in the second half. The Huskies capitalized, going on a 17-2 run to go up 35-32 with 2:30 remaining in the game.
“I knew they weren’t going to give up after they gave up such a big lead,” Ybarra said of his mindset at that point. “So we knew they had something in their bag. Andrew is such a creative guy.”
With 1:37 left, Blake Roberts floated in two of his team-high nine points off a hard, right-handed drive from the wing to put the Huskies back up by three. Grant Iverson responded with a deep triple of his own 20 seconds later.
“It was big,” Behrendt said of the clutch 3-pointer from Iverson, who had a game-high 12 points. “It was important to tie it up to give ourselves a fighting chance.”
Coming out of a timeout, Jackson Wansley gave a dribble hand off to Roberts, who charged off a double screen with his left hand. His drive ended with the ball deflecting off a Vail Mountain player’s foot. On the ensuing out of bounds play, Charlie Strauch found an uncovered Wansley in the corner. The junior drilled the a go-ahead 3-pointer in front of his bench. Ybarra said Wansley and Sawyer Willis were instrumental in securing the win through their leadership and on-court vision.
“They communicated to their guys on how to stay focused and calm during the game,” the coach said. “And they just read the floor really well.”
Charlie Vidal made things interesting, though, scoring with 38 seconds left to make it a one-point affair. But Wansley hit two free throws on the next possession and Vail Mountain couldn’t convert a 3-pointer before the final buzzer.
Even though Behrendt identified areas for growth 鈥� “turnovers, finishing, handling pressure, stuff like that,” he said 鈥� Tuesday’s game was an improvement from last year’s trip to Edwards, a 60-26 loss.
“I think we are a very different team this year,” he added. “Our team chemistry is really strong this year; I think we’re really deep. … I often tell these guys, for all the nitpicking, we’re a good team that can fix some things to get better. And ultimately our goal is to be playing the best basketball at the end of the year.”
Vail Mountain fell to 5-3 going into Friday’s home contest against De Beque. Battle Mountain improved to 3-4 and will look to keep the momentum going Thursday night at Delta. Having come back against Rifle and Meeker earlier this year, Ybarra said Tuesday’s win proved that basketball has two halves for a reason.
“That’s what it’s there for: to show a different side of us and adjust so we can get a win,” he said. “So I think the boys seeing that 鈥� we’ve got more wins coming, just with that confidence.”
