Eric Arnett was a physical presence inside and Tommy Morris
found the range from the perimeter and the foul line to lead
Bradford to a 74-56 victory over Blackhawk in the first round of
the PIAA Class AAA playoffs Friday night at the Pitt-Bradford Sport
& Fitness Center.
Bradford (17-9) now advances to the second round on Tuesday
against Moon, a 65-60 winner over Erie Strong Vincent Friday night.
The site and time will be announced.
Arnett and Morris finished with 50 of the District 9 champion
Owls points, but there were a number of other key performances in
the game as well that didn’t necessarily show up in the
scorebook.
“Eric (Arnett) is very agile and was very aggressive inside
tonight,” said Owls’ coach Dave Fuhrman of his big man who finished
with a game-high 26 points.
Arnett sealed the Owls’ 17th win of the season with two big
baskets that capped a 12-3 Bradford run inside the four-minute mark
after the Cougars had trimmed their deficit to four points.
Meanwhile, Morris, who put 24 points in the book, added to the
hosts’ margin at the foul line where he went 8-of-10 in the final
five minutes of the game.
“Tommy made some big baskets for us,” Fuhrman noted. Morris
missed several perimeter shots in the first half he didn’t have to
take, but his coach quickly pointed out, “He’s (Morris) a shooter.
When he feels it’s there, the ball goes up and we don’t want him to
stop shooting.”
Running Bradford’s floor game was point guard Shane Hvizdzak who
was pressured all night and on defense covered Blackhawk’s Josh
Gumbert who was held to 10 points.
“Shane is a very good point guard and tonight he did an
outstanding job defensively on Gumbert,” Fuhrman observed.
Ben Lanich also played his part with some bone-jarring rebounds
that he wasn’t about to give up.
“Ben rebounds well in traffic,” Fuhrman remarked. “He’s only a
sophomore, but you’re not going to take the ball away from him.
“We got good minutes from our bench tonight, too,” added the
Owls’ coach. “We can’t keep our three big guys out of the game for
long, but Doug Rose, Ryan LaBrozzi and Ben Walter came in and did a
great job for us.
“This was a good win. It will build our confidence and you can
see that our strength of schedule really helps get us ready for the
playoffs. I’m really glad that we performed well in front of our
hometown crowd tonight,” he added.
With Blackhawk coming out of the WPIAL, there was no doubt it
was going to be a physical game and Bradford was ready for it.
“We had them scouted well and knew their sets. The kids did a
great job taking them out of their game and making them create
things,.” Fuhrman explained.
It was Arnett’s basket inside and Morris’ three-pointer from the
wing that got the Owls off to a 5-0 start and a lead they would
never give up.
Blackhawk, met toe-to-toe by the Owls, finally got on the board
with a layup by Ed Coleman, but Bradford ran off six unanswered
points and then got a rebound put-back by Arnett to go up by 11,
15-4, with about two minutes left. The difference stood at 10,
21-11, when the buzzer sounded to end the first eight minutes of
play.
The Cougars cut the Owls lead to seven, 26-19 on Nick Cron’s
layup at the 3:14 mark of the second quarter, but Arnett and Morris
answered with jumpers and Bradford pulled away to a 12-point
margin, 33-21, on a pair of Hvizdzak foul shots with 1:05 remaining
in the half.
At the intermission Bradford left the floor leading by 10,
35-25.
Morris buried a three-pointer from the corner to get the Owls
scoring started in the second half and Lanich came up with two
buckets, the second on a loose ball he grabbed after an Arnett
block, to give Bradford a 13-point lead, 42-29, three minutes into
the period.
The visitors could gain no ground the rest of the quarter as
Arnett gave the Owls their biggest lead of the game, 14 points,
54-40, with 15 seconds left. The hosts headed into the final eight
minutes of play with a 12-point advantage 54-42.
Realizing that time was running out, the Cougars turned up the
heat with an 8-0 run highlighted by Antoine Childs’ dunk and
fast-break layup to slash the Owls lead to four, 54-50, with 5:33
left in the game.
“We let him get down the floor twice on us,” Fuhrman observed.
“We let up a little on our transition game.”
Bradford answered the challenge with Morris’ two foul shots and
Arnett’s basket inside, following a Cougar turnover, to go back up
by eight, 58-50.
Blackhawk could get no closer as Bradford slammed the door shut
with the final eight points, the last basket a 25-footer just ahead
of the buzzer by Rob Gault, for the final 74-56 victory.
“People don’t realize how far we’ve come,” Fuhrman exclaimed.
“We started out 1-4 in our first five games and now have won 16 of
our last 21. We’re playing our best ball at the right time of the
year. We’re loose and relaxed and you can see the results.”
Childs was the Cougars’ leading scorer with 21 points, while
Cron joined Gumbert in double figures with 12.
Blackhawk finishes the season at 13-15.
