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Show i Miners victorious j despite poor shooting 1 Mi A 1 by Randy llanskat . Nobody said you had to be perfect to win. The Dolphins may cough the 1 ball up a few times, but that doesn't ! stop them. W ayne Gretzky may have a bad game for the Edmonton Oilers, but the puck still goes in the net. Jack Morris may walk a couple of guys, but the Tigers still eat 'em. The Miners may shoot only 52 percent from the free throw line, or 35 percent from the field, but they can still win, too. That is what they did against Tintic last Friday night in Miner Gym by the score of 73-66. The win put the Miners at 2-0 on the season. I At times the action last Friday night looked more like football than ' basketball, as Tintic played a very physical game. A total of five Miners fouled out of the game, four of the five S starters. I But the story of this second I conquest of the year for Park City was in shooting. "I wasn't happy with our shooting," Miner Coach Paul Willard Wil-lard said afterwards. "We had a lot of shots; we should've put the game out of reach much faster." As it was, the Miners controlled most of the second half, usually leading by seven or eight points, but couldn't put Tintic away. One amazing statistic about the field goal percentage of Park City was in proximity to the basket. Willard said of the 66 Park City shots, 34 were from inside the key. Of those 34, the Miners made only 16, or less than 50 percent. Willard said from 65 to 70 percent of those shots should go in. He isn't worried, however. He thinks time will correct a lot of the shooting problems they aren't due to poor ability. Rather, he looked to inexperience for the answer. "The kids simply need to learn to play under pressure," he said. "Then those shots will start falling." Much of the reason behind the Park City triumph was Scott Tatum and Dave Vida. Tatum had 22 points, Vida 17. Beyond scoring they dominated the boards. Tatum had 17 rebounds, nine offensive, which he often turned into easy puckets. Vida also had 17 rebounds, but the majority of his, 12, came on the defensive boards. Willard said both did a very good job "working for position." Tatum is an interesting piece of this year's Park City puzzle. At 5'11" he is hardly the height of most centers, but that is his position nonetheless. And matched against a ' guy five inches taller, his stats spoke for themselves against Tintic. Willard said Tatum has "good physical strength," and plays with a lot of "aggressiveness." In both games this year he has prevailed "J mightily. Vida has been acting as the Miners' sixth man, in the manner of Kevin McHale of the Celtics. He comes off the bench and does it all. "I don't know if we can keep him on the bench for long the way he's been playing," Willard said. Matt Mapstone had another good game for Park City, scoring 14 points. Willard was happy to have three players in double figures that -shows good scoring balance, he said. He thinks the offense should become even more balanced as players such as Todd Mullen and Bruce Buckner become more seasoned. If you forget about the fouls, the . Miners shone on defense. Tintic was forced to shoot almost exclusively from the outside, and they did a good job of it, but not good enough. Willard said he plans to keep it that way, if possible. "If you can force a high school team to make most of its shots from outside, you will win most times." Throughout the first half, the game was close, as Tintic bombers hit from the outside. For Park City, Tatum's spirited play kept the Miners from becoming frustrated by Tintic's physical play. Such tactics continued in the second half as Tintic put Park City into the penalty less than two minutes into the third quarter. The Miners were outhustling Tintic, and seemed on the verge of running away from them throughout the half. With 1:23 left in the third Vida gave Park City its largest lead of the game, 10 points, on a fine steal and layup to make the score 52-42. Then on the inbounds play for Tintic, Vida again, made a steal, but his shot rolled around the rim and out. At the quarter the score stood at 54-46 Park City. From there on Tintic was never closer than six points, on the way to the 76-66 loss. Having already matched half of the winning output of last year's Park City team, the Miners now face two tough matchups this week in the Summit County Tournament. Two 1A teams and two 2 A teams will take part: Park City and South Summit (1A), and Morgan and Wasatch (2A). The tournament will be played Friday night in Park City and Saturday night in Kamas. On Friday South Summit will meet Wasatch in Miner Gym at 5:45 p.m. The Miners will play Morgan afterward at 7:30. Then the action will move to South Summit High Saturday night, the first game being Wasatch and Park City at 5:45, followed by South Summit and Morgan. Willard said he doesn't know much about either Wasatch or Morgan, but expects two tough games. Both schools are 2A. Body bumpin! Miner Greg King (left) puts the body into his Tintic rival to hamper the shot attempt. photos by Randy Hanskat . - . - .- '-f """"" J1'- fi ''iff 17 , &i Park City forward Todd Mullen puts a rude stuff on this Tintic advance while Dave Vida looks on. jPf, - ' in- r n mi-Hi. i 11 H 1 ' i l Mull ill 'inn Irmrrnii.1 ---. Mark Knudsen (center) came off the bench to pull down a couple key rebounds, but didn't make any friends on the Tintic side, as this photo shows. 1 f . |