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Show z . ': Miners Suffer Ups, Downs at State Tournament in Provo Brad Goff and Tim King huddle with Miner Coach Brace Held. Influenza contributed to a disappointing showing for the Park High Miners in last week's 1-A state tournament at Brigham Young University in Provo, forcing stand-out guard Dave Radford out of action for all but a few minutes in the opening round. The loss of Radford took the punch out of the Miner offense, and the team dropped out of contention for the state crown in their first contest Wednesday. Park City rallied to take Region 10 champs Monticello in the second round Thursday, but a multitude of misfortunes surfaced during a disastrous show-down with Dugway in the "Consolation" "Consola-tion" bracket semi-finals Friday and the Miners left Provo without placing in the standings with only next year's prospects to ease the frustration. The Miners were not alone in facing flu germs as their primary opponent as rival South Summit, Region 11 champs, fell to North Sevier in the championship game Saturday with four of their starters fighting off the bug. Region 1 1 teams took four spots in the top eight, equalling region 8's production and shutting region 10 completely out of the standings, but the region as a whole was edged out in the final analysis. Region 8's North Sevier claimed claim-ed the state championship, with South Summit second, Kanab third, tournament favorites Pan-guitch Pan-guitch in fourth, Milford the consolation bracket winner in fifth, and region 11 's St. Joseph, surprising North Rich and Dugway Dug-way placing sixth, seventh and eighth, respectively. In their opening round Wednesday Wed-nesday against the Kanab Cowboys, Cow-boys, Park City stayed close, but lacked the offensive attack to advance in the tournament against the team that eventually took third place. With Radford starting the game saddled with a 103 degree temperature, the Miners concentrated concen-trated on stopping 6-3 senior center Kim Glover on the inside. Park City succeeded in stopping stop-ping Kanab's inside game, but Radford was soon benched to rest his fever and the Cowboys took the advantage on outside shooting shoot-ing by 6-1 forward Don Glover, the big center's brother. The Miners stayed close and were behind only four points, 28-24, in the closing seconds of the first half, but key mistakes turned what could have been an opportunity into an unfortunate turn of events. With the ball in their possession posses-sion and the opportunity to advance to within two points of the Cowboys, Park City turned the ball over with only 15 seconds showing on the clock. Two fouls under the boards gave Kanab four shots from the charity stripe and the Cowboys converted on three, turning what could have been a two point lead into a sudden 31-24 advantage. The opening minutes of the second half also showed promise as Park City held Kanab scoreless for more than four minutes, but with Radford on the bench, the Miners could only produce two points of their own. Park City stayed within five to nine points the rest of the contest, but were banished to the consolation bracket by a 57-48 loss. Howard Davidson led the Miners with 24 points, exactly half their total output. The highlight of the tournament tourna-ment for the Miners came Thursday when the team shook the region 10 champion Monticello Monticel-lo Buckaroos with a decisive 63-51 victory. Park City led all the way, blowing apart the Monticello full-court press with an effective fast break to consistently line up easy shots under the basket. In place of Radford, who by this time was home in bed, Coach Bruce Reid started 5-8 junior Jerry Johnson. Johnson played well, leading the fast break "admirable," said Reid. The Miners produced a balanced attack, with four starters start-ers breaking into double figures. "If we had made all our layups, we would have beaten them by 30 points," said Reid. Park City quickly jumped off to a 9-2 lead midway in the first period on two jumps shots and converted free throws by Howard Davidson, and a three-point play by Brad Goff on an inside drive. The Bucks stayed within reach on the strength of 6-3 senior Mark Hugentobler's shooting, but the Miners remained ahead 13-8 at the end of the first period. Hugentobler ended up the game's leading scorer with 21 points. In spite of attempts to shut-down Monticello's big man, the Buck's came back to within three points midway through the period before Marty Cowin drove in, Tim King hit a free throw and Davidson produced another jumper. jump-er. At halftime, the Miners led 32-26. Missed layups by Park City kept the Bucks in the game in the third quarter, as Miner players blew not less than five easy shots to help. Monticello draw within three points again at the 1:30 mark. Park City appeared to be sputtering on offense and in danger of losing their advantage as the period ended, but a strong fourth quarter, in which the Miners outscored their opponents 20-12, iced their victory. The Miners revived their momentum by rattling off 11 unanswered points to kick off the final eight minutes on a jump-shot, jump-shot, two free throws and a tip-in by Todd Hunter, free throws by King and Davidson, and a straight ahead drive by Brad Goff. With 4:18 remaining and Park City ahead 56-43, the game appeared decided when the Bucks' big man, Hugentobler, committed his fifth foul and walked to the bench. The Miners cruised in for a final score of 63-51 while the second team saw several minutes of action. In contrast, Friday's game against Dugway, which split their region 11 match-ups against Park City in regular season on their way to a division title, was a "fiasco", said Reid. With Radford still in bed, the Miners came out on the floor with a surprise man-to-man defense and managed to stay close for four minutes, but then everything began to fall apart. The two teams were tied at eight points each when Dugway's 6 foot senior forward Tico McCurdy drove in for two quick baskets and the Miners sufferred a critical blow-Jerry Johnson, Radford's substitute, crashed to the floor and left the -game with an injured knee. The Mustangs took the momentum mo-mentum and scored six of the next seven points to claim an 18-11 advantage at the end of the first period. The Miners came back to within three points in the first two minutes of the second period on baskets by Todd Hunter and Marty Cowin, but the wind was taken out of their sails when Tim King was called for his fourth foul and had to be taken out of the game by Coach Reid. A quick taping job by Jack Dozier brought Jerry Johnson back into the game, but the young guard was hampered by an obvious limp and Park City fell into confusion with missed shots and turnovers. Meanwhile, Dugway's star center, 5-11 Paul Brown, came alive and led a charge that produced 9 unanswered points to put Park City on the wrong end of a 27-15 score. Brown eventually scored 27 points in the contest. At this point, Johnson was taken out of the game for good to nurse his injury. To make matters worse, Park City's star forward Howard Davidson, demoralized from the frustrating turn of events, broke from the game plan and began free-lancing, contrary to Coach Reid's instructions. With 1:12 left in the half, Reid angrily benched Davidson and the team went into the locker room behind 31-21. Davidson started the second half, but Dugway promptly scored the first two baskets and Reid, ' - - ' ' ! -" ' ' ' - 1 K, if y , i : ; f I , f i if- . , J : i . . ). , , , i - ; i: t Marty Cowin and Brad Goff tangle with Dugway's Paul Brown and Tlco McCurdy over something that got away. |