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Show George Thompson goes up with a jumper in liryce Valley's 81-53 win over Escalante. Thompson Mustangs Clinch Tournament Spot By John Yardley The Bryce Valley Mustangs outgunned the Milford Tigers in Kanab Saturday afternoon 66-54 to clinch a spot in the State 1A tournament in Provo. With the victory, the Mustangs can do no worse than fourth in the Region 12 tournament, guaranteeing the galloping green and white a favorable state tourney seeding. On Friday, the Mustangs swept past Escalante 84-53, setting up the game with Milford. With the two wins, the BV team now plays Beaver Thursday at 1:30 p.m. in Kanab to see who plays for the region title. Bryce Valley dealt the Beavers their only loss of the season earlier this year in Tropic. Panguitch opened the tournament last week with a come-from-behind win over Parowan 66-54, but was demolished by Beaver 72-39 on Saturday. Escalante suffered the loss to BV Friday, then played Wayne Saturday before finally bowing 57-56. The losses by the Moquis ended their season, but for Panguitch there is still hope. The Bobcats take on Milford Thursday, with a win qualifying them for state. A loss would result in Panguitch playing "back" across the bracket on Friday night at 5:45 p.m. against the winner of North Sevier and Valley. The Bobcats would then have to win Friday and Saturday to get a chance for a playoff with a nothern region team to determine the final spot in the state tournament. racked up 28 the following day against Milford to put team in state tournament. Jm. In last Friday's action between Escalante and Bryce Valley, the Mustangs were again lead by the balanced scoring of Wade Ramsay with 24, Richard Ott 23, and George Thompson with 18. Escalante got some fine play from Ricky Crawford who hit for 15 and Dirk Durfey and Clint Porter who scored 14 a piece. Panguitch, meanwhile, came back from a 31-28 half time deficit to take the win from Parowan. Kris Barney had the outside jumper going to lead the Bobcats with 19. Jody Davis had a productive game with 17 and Nate Brinkerhoff hit 13. That game set up Saturday's contest with the defending 1A state champion Beaver. After an early first quarter score of 7-6, the Beavers rolled off 12 unanswered points to make it over before the game had hardly begun. Steve Hutchings, Brian Wood and Thane Marshall, all three All-State material, blew by Panguitch like a hot knife through butter. Kris Barney and Jody Davis lead a second quarter surge, but the Bobcats were outmanned this year. Barney hit 12 and Davis 10 in the lowest point total for Panguitch on the year. Escalante played a consistent game Saturday against Wayne, but could never seem to get over the "hump."Clint Porter, Dirk Durfey, Ricky Crawford, Jerry Hawks and David Reed worked hard with help off the bench from Lee Davis and Ward Coombs, but the Badgers put it away in the final period. Bryce Valley was a different story, The Mustangs came out "a- blazin' " with Ott and Thompson on fire. Thompson, in possibly his best game of the season, scored a tournament high 28 and Ott tanked 25 as the two Mustang big men went to work. Milford made a game of it with John Datson and Mark Yardley inside, but a logging chain could not have held back George Thompson in this game. He went to the hoop strong time and time again, and Richard Ott "wooed" the crowd with his slick jumpers. Ramsay was a little off with his (Continued on Page 2) Karl Jolley goes in for a shot off the glass as Kris Harney moves on rebound. Panguitch lipped Parowan Hams 66-51. Mustangs Clinch Spot (Continued from Page 1) shooting touch, but he, Dallin Baugh, and Troy Goulding passed off, played defense and hustled all the way, Scott Chynoweth came off the bench to drill some nice shots as well. Amazingly, Ott played a quarter and a half with four fouls. At one point Milford cut the lead from 11 to 2, but the Mustangs rolled it back up to eight within a minute of play. The final (tt-54. Beaver definitely has an excellent team, but in today's game if the Mustangs are firing all five cylinders, the Beavers could very well pick up their second loss of the season. It may come courtesy of the team that gave them their first loss, the Bryce Valley Mustangs. |