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Show Biyce Valley Mustangs Claim Region 12 Title By John Yardley The Bryce Valley Mustangs won their first ever Region 12 Round Robin Championship Saturday night in Cedar City, defeating the Milford Tigers 84-70 in the title game. Coach Dan Haskell had his team on a roll as they escaped with 67-66 win over Enterprise on Thursday, then had the top game in the tournament with a 89-80 win over Piute Friday and rode a lead all the way to the title over Milford. In other games, Panguitch lost a close one to Milford the first day 58-55, thumped Parowan 67-50 on Friday and never did get going in a 65-47 loss to Wayne the final day as they were eliminated from state play. On Thursday, Derrick Clark stepped to the free-throw line with two seconds remaining and hit one of two charity tosses to give the Mustangs their first win of the tournament. The boys in green were not at their best in that one. The next night, however, against Piute, BV could not have played any better. The team hit 15 of 18 from the field in the second half and 15 of 15 from the free-throw line to stop an excellent Piute team. Terrific team scoring from Thad Feltner, 24, Bryant Shakespear, 22, Derrick Clark, 18, Mike Ahlstrom, 15, Ryan Shakespear, 7, and Brett Palmer, 4, all added up to a great win. Every time Piute made a run, the Mustangs picked it up and went on a scoring binge of their own. In the championship game, the MusUiiigs went out to an early lead 28-11 and were never really in trouble after that. Ryan Shakespear led a defensive charge with 7 blocked shots that shut down the strong inside game of Milford. Derrick Clark was hot, finishing with 31 points, as BV stretched out a 63-48 lead after three quarters. In reality, the championship game was played on Friday. In the title game, great team play was again in order, with Bryant Shakespear hitting for 14, Mike Ahlstrom, 13, Brett Palmer in a sterling game off the bench with 10, Thad Feltner hit 5 as the floor general and David Shakespear off the bench cold played near perfection per-fection for a quarter and a half in the end of this important game, also scoring 5 points. "Our team worked hard inside and we were consistent," said a jubilant coach Dan Haskell in his first year as coach of the Mustangs after the big victory. Bryce Valley now awaits the State 1A Tournament Tourn-ament to be played again in Cedar City, beginning March 11. Panguitch played hot and cold in the tournament. Cold the first half against Milford, then turned it on to really have a good chance at winning in the end, but alas, missed three front ends of one and one opportunity in the final minutes while holding a three-point lead, to lose 58-55. Brian Harris led the scoring for PHS in that one with 13 points. Against Parowan, without question the bottom team in the tournament, the Bobcats had very little trouble, with Bryan Richards hitting for 25 and Ray Richards for 14 in a 67-50 victory. On Saturday, it was back to cold for a whole game, losing to Wayne 65-46. 65-46. It never was as close as Wayne qualified for their second time in history for state tournament play. Bryan Richards was the main scoring man with 17. On the final day, Piute stopped Valley 77-62, for the third and fourth, to go along with the two other games on the day. In post-tournament honors, Valley won the sportsmanship trophy awarded by the tournament referees and the all-region team as voted upon by the coaches was as follows: Chris Barnes, Milford; Jeremy Chamberlain, Valley; Thad Feltner, Bryce Valley; Klyn Gleave, Piute; Todd Hunt, Enterprise; Kade Morrell, Wayne; Todd Puffer, Milford; Bryan Richards .Panguitch; Lee Robinson, Piute; and Bryant Shakespear, Bryce Valley. In this writer's opinion, Derrick Clark of Bryce Valley was overlooked, over-looked, with a strong case for Ryan Shakespear and Mike Ahlstrom, but there are only so many spots on the team. Once again, congratulations congrat-ulations to Bryce Valley on the region championship. |
