CURWENSVILLE—-Whatever Harmony Head Coach Terry Kruise said at halftime Monday night against Curwensville should be bottled and used accordingly. Down by 13 at the break, the Owls came out energized, picking up their offense and turning up the heat on defense to win 52-50 at Patton Hall. The victory finds Harmony still perfect on the season with a 20-0 record. The icing also was Harmony wrapping up the Moshannon Valley League title with the come from behind victory. It was the first time Harmony has won back to back Mo Valley League Championships in 48 years since the 57-58 & 58-59 Owls.
Afterwards Tide Head Coach Matt Wassil spoke to Gantdaily’s Fred Kavelak. “It seemed like we shouldn’t have said anything to them at halftime, because everything we told them not to do, they came out and started to do. When we were on offense, we had the lead, we wanted to work the ball until we got a solid, good shot.” Wassil went on to say “We didn’t have to thread any needles, throw any crazy passes. It just seemed like they did the exact opposite of what we told them to do.”
“I felt we were playing like we were behind. I felt, for no reason we started to play like we needed to make up ground, and then we started to get sloppy.”
The Tide jumped put to a 16-13 first quarter lead and outscored the Owls by 10 in the second frame to go the locker room up 37-24. Philip Michaels paced Curwensville with 10 points in the first half but was also tenacious on the boards and found several teammates underneath for easy lay-ups with some fancy, cleaver no look passes.
So the upset was on. Or so the Tide faithful thought. Harmony of course had other ideas as they blew Curwensville away in the third stanza by 12 to cut the lead to 44-43. The fourth quarter wasn’t much better for the Tide as they were outscored 9-6 and 28-13 on the half. Numerous forced and unforced turnovers, coupled with some missed easy buckets sealed the Tide’s fate.
Kruise said after the game that “We were worried at halftime so we went to straight man to man and knew we needed to get better help.” About his squads second half effort he added “ It was amazing to me to have them come back from 13 points down on the road to a team as strong as Curwensville.”
In scoring only 13 second half points Wassil said “I think the most frustrating part about the thirteen points in the second half is its one thing if you don’t score because the team is playing suffocating defense. We had shots. We just didn’t make anything. We had kids shooting from 7, 5 feet away, and when you go zero for eight from that distance there’s the game.” Wassil continued, “We make three or four of those eight, which isn’t even a good percentage, we win the game. We just didn’t make them. That killed us.”
“They made us get tougher looks, maybe in the second half than we did in the first, but they weren’t impossible looks. It’s just as simple as that.”
Michaels led the Tide with 17 points and Craig Bartlett had 10. Chris Priester paced Harmony with 20 and teammate Cody Rydbom dropped in 10.
Curwensville is now 10-7 on the season and plays at home again Wednesday night as they host DuBois Central Catholic. On Friday they travel to Johnsonburg to take on the Rams and Calvin Grumley. Grumley just recently went over 2,000 points for his career.
Harmony also won the junior varsity game 64-57.
TOTALS
HARMONY—-Dylan Gee 2 3-5 7, Christopher Priester 7 6-9 20, Justin Royer 2 1-2 5,
Cody Rydbom 3 4-6 10, Jeremy Priester 4 1-2 9, Nathan Brothers 0 1-2 1, Daran Peace 0 0-0 0,
and Joey Schneider 0 0-0 0.
TOTALS 18 16-26 52
CURWENSVILLE—-Philip Michaels 6 4-5 17, Shawn Sopic 3 1-2 7, Ben McGary 1 0-0 2,
Brandon McDonald 2 2-2 6, Craig Bartlett 3 2-2 10, David Kalgren 1 0-2 2 and Joey Palmer 3 0-4 6.
TOTALS 19 9-17 50
SCORE BY QUARTERS
HARMONY 13 11 19 9 52
CURWENSVILLE 16 21 7 6 50
THREE POINTERS—-Curwensville (3)—Bartlett -2 and Michaels-1.