ST. MARYS — Friday night’s bout was the exact type of defensive rock fight fans have come to expect between Ridgway and Elk County Catholic, and once again, the Crusaders proved they were up for the challenge.

In a game that featured plenty of tough defense, big collisions in the paint and a raucous crowd, ECC grinded out a 42-32 win over the Elkers to preserve its undefeated record.

The Crusaders (14-0) held Ridgway (8-5) well below its per game average of 44 points, the second time this year ECC has managed to do so. Elk Catholic topped Ridgway 38-30 in a nearly identical game back during the Elk County Holiday Tournament.

And just as it was during that first matchup, the defensive effort started with focusing on Ridgway’s two leading scorers, Matt Dush and Zack Zameroski, who were each averaging roughly 15 points per game entering the contest.

But Dush was kept to just eight points, and was held scoreless in the first and fourth quarters, while Zameroski was limited to seven. In the first matchup between the two teams, that duo was kept to 19 collective points.

“They’re two very good players and different types of players,” ECC head coach Aaron Straub said. “Dush gets a lot of points on penetration, and we tried to keep him out of the lane. We weren’t as successful as I would’ve liked to have been, because he did create some baskets going to the (rim).

“And Zack gets a lot of points on backdoors that we tried to take away. We still gave him a couple.”

The Crusaders weren’t willing to give any of it up early, though. ECC took a 9-5 lead through the first quarter, during which Dush and Zameroski were held off the board.

But just as the duo started to get going in the second, so did the Crusader offense. While the Dush-Zameroski combination scored eight of Ridgway’s 13 points in the period, ECC’s potent guard duo of Regis Wortman and Mark Kraus struck for 12 of ECC’s 15 points to maintain a 24-18 lead into the break.

Wortman led all scorers with 12 points on the night, while Kraus scored 10.

Perhaps no shot was bigger than the three-pointer Wortman drilled to end the half to put ECC up six with 40 seconds to go.

“We were in two different defenses and walked away from the ball, which is a cardinal sin,” Ridgway coach Tony Allegretto said of the play. “When that happened, it gave (ECC) a little momentum… I thought we competed the whole game, and we had a really good first half, but we needed to get the lead. We’re a team that needs to play with the lead.”

Unfortunately for his Elkers, a lead never came. The teams traded baskets through a back-and-forth third quarter that saw each team score nine points, and then in the fourth, Elk Catholic slowed the game down and took plenty of time off the clock with each possession, preventing the Elkers from ever getting back to within striking distance.

Ridgway went on a pair of lengthy scoring droughts during a fourth that saw the Elkers score just five points. Ridgway went 6:18 between scoring its final basket of the third quarter and its first basket of the fourth, which came at the 4:25 mark. The next Elker basket didn’t come until 26 seconds were left in the game.

“In pretty much all of our losses, which have been against good teams, we’ve had a dry spell,” Allegretto said. “There have been a lot of halves where we’ve come out in the third quarter with a lead, but then we get into a dry spell and give up six or eight points.”

And then as those droughts wore on, Ridgway was forced to foul and put ECC on the foul line.

The Crusaders were happy to oblige, as Elk Catholic went 7-for-10 from the charity stripe in the fourth to put the game away.

“Once you decide you’re spreading the floor, you better be prepared to shoot and make free throws,” Straub said. “I feel very comfortable with the guys out there on the line. A lot of games are won and lost on the line, so we need to keep making free throws.”

The unbeaten Crusaders visit Kane Monday for an AML North matchup.

Ridgway, whose five losses have come to teams with a combined 42-12 record, visits Curwensville Tuesday.

AT ST. MARYS

Ridgway (32)

Matt Dush 3 2-2 8, Bon 2 0-0 5, Allegretto 2 0-0 5, Zameroski 3 1-1 7, Park 3 0-0 7. Totals: 13 3-3 32

Elk Catholic (42)

Regis Wortman 5 0-0 12, Leo Gregory 4 2-2 10, Mark Kraus 4 0-0 10, I. Wortman 1 0-1 2, Lindemuth 0 2-3 2, Uberti 0 3-4 3, Breindel 1 0-0 3. Totals: 15 7-10 42

Ridgway 5 18 27 32

Elk Catholic 9 24 33 42

Three-point goals: Ridgway 3 (Allegretto 1, Bon 1, Park 1), ECC 5 (R. Wortman 2, Kraus 2, Breindel 1); Total fouls: Ridgway 14, ECC 14; fouled out: none.

JV: Elk Catholic won, 53-32