NORTON —
The legs were there for the home stretch.
Turning up their transition game in crunch time, Bishop Stang scored 21 fourth-quarter points to beat Norton 56-52 in a Division 3 South boys’ basketball first-round game Wednesday night at Norton High School.
A five-point third quarter left the Spartans behind 38-35, but a Tyler Dedrick fast-break basket immediately got things going in the fourth.
Stang scored the first six points of the fourth quarter. And after Norton’s Steve Burrill buried a 3-pointer to tie the game, the Spartans rattled off the nine points to lead 50-41 with 2:49 remaining.
This win sends the Spartans (13-6) into the quarterfinals against top-seeded Medway (18-3) on Friday at 7 p.m.
Five of Stang’s nine fourth-quarter baskets came on fast breaks. Three of those came against Norton’s full-court press after a Norton basket. And the final two of those were scored by 6-foot-2 senior Matt Vargas, after the eighth-seeded Lancers had closed to 52-45 and then to 54-49 with 26.6 seconds to play.
“At the end, our transition game finally kicked in,” Stang coach Joe Balestracci said. “It’s a big court, so I was a little worried about us getting tired But I don’t know if they (Norton) were a little tired maybe.”
In the closing minutes, after having bumped its lead to as many as nine points, the Spartans, with guards Ryan Early and Dedrick at the throttle, efficiently executed the offense.
“We want to score in transition if we have it,” Balestracci said.. “If not we want to pull it out, delay for half the shot clock, and then run an offense. Three or four times we came down and got a layup, so that’s great.”
A.J. Marshall, with eight fourth-quarter points, finished with a team-high 16. Vargas scored seven of his 14 points in the fourth.
Melanson, Stang’s 6-6 senior, was the man early. He scored Stang’s first eight points, in the opening 4:26.
“They (Norton) started doubling down. They started looking for the ball going into him,” Balestracci said. “So you can’t leave Vargas alone. Dedrick can shoot even better than he did tonight, I think, and Early. And Marshall gave us some huge hoops tonight. Huge hoops. A jump shot from the corner. That 10-foot layup. He had a heck of a game, too.”
Early and Dedrick each had two big assists for layups in the last three minutes.
Stang did have a couple late hiccups. A five-second violation on an inbound and then a foul on a tough 3-point shot. But right after Norton’s Steve Burrill converted two of the three free throws to make it 54-49, early fed a streaking Vargas for Stang’s final points.
For Norton (15-8), Colin Feeney, a 6-4 junior, bagged a game-high 22 points, including 10 in the first quarter when he and Melanson went head to head.
No other Lancer scored in double figures. Senior guard Joe Wilkes scored eight and senior forward Joe Tessier came off the bench to bag seven.
“They (Stang) got good high-percentage shots at the beginning of that fourth quarter,” Liberatore said, “and that put us in a hole.
“That’s an 8-9 game, evenly matched,. Obviously (Peter) Melanson had a great game for them. We played him better in the second half. They rebounded the ball better than us, and I thought that was a nice advantage for them. They made a couple of more plays than we did in the fourth quarter to their credit.”
Turning up their transition game in crunch time, Bishop Stang scored 21 fourth-quarter points to beat Norton 56-52 in a Division 3 South boys’ basketball first-round game Wednesday night at Norton High School.
A five-point third quarter left the Spartans behind 38-35, but a Tyler Dedrick fast-break basket immediately got things going in the fourth.
Stang scored the first six points of the fourth quarter. And after Norton’s Steve Burrill buried a 3-pointer to tie the game, the Spartans rattled off the nine points to lead 50-41 with 2:49 remaining.
This win sends the Spartans (13-6) into the quarterfinals against top-seeded Medway (18-3) on Friday at 7 p.m.
Five of Stang’s nine fourth-quarter baskets came on fast breaks. Three of those came against Norton’s full-court press after a Norton basket. And the final two of those were scored by 6-foot-2 senior Matt Vargas, after the eighth-seeded Lancers had closed to 52-45 and then to 54-49 with 26.6 seconds to play.
“At the end, our transition game finally kicked in,” Stang coach Joe Balestracci said. “It’s a big court, so I was a little worried about us getting tired But I don’t know if they (Norton) were a little tired maybe.”
In the closing minutes, after having bumped its lead to as many as nine points, the Spartans, with guards Ryan Early and Dedrick at the throttle, efficiently executed the offense.
“We want to score in transition if we have it,” Balestracci said.. “If not we want to pull it out, delay for half the shot clock, and then run an offense. Three or four times we came down and got a layup, so that’s great.”
A.J. Marshall, with eight fourth-quarter points, finished with a team-high 16. Vargas scored seven of his 14 points in the fourth.
Melanson, Stang’s 6-6 senior, was the man early. He scored Stang’s first eight points, in the opening 4:26.
“They (Norton) started doubling down. They started looking for the ball going into him,” Balestracci said. “So you can’t leave Vargas alone. Dedrick can shoot even better than he did tonight, I think, and Early. And Marshall gave us some huge hoops tonight. Huge hoops. A jump shot from the corner. That 10-foot layup. He had a heck of a game, too.”
Early and Dedrick each had two big assists for layups in the last three minutes.
Stang did have a couple late hiccups. A five-second violation on an inbound and then a foul on a tough 3-point shot. But right after Norton’s Steve Burrill converted two of the three free throws to make it 54-49, early fed a streaking Vargas for Stang’s final points.
For Norton (15-8), Colin Feeney, a 6-4 junior, bagged a game-high 22 points, including 10 in the first quarter when he and Melanson went head to head.
No other Lancer scored in double figures. Senior guard Joe Wilkes scored eight and senior forward Joe Tessier came off the bench to bag seven.
“They (Stang) got good high-percentage shots at the beginning of that fourth quarter,” Liberatore said, “and that put us in a hole.
“That’s an 8-9 game, evenly matched,. Obviously (Peter) Melanson had a great game for them. We played him better in the second half. They rebounded the ball better than us, and I thought that was a nice advantage for them. They made a couple of more plays than we did in the fourth quarter to their credit.”
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