BANGOR, Maine — Stout defense was the common denominator as No. 2 Southern Aroostook of Dyer Brook and No. 3 Fort Fairfield advanced in the Eastern Maine Class D boys basketball tournament with quarterfinal victories Monday afternoon.
In the first game of the day at the Cross Insurance Center, Robbie Watson scored 21 points as Fort Fairfield defeated No. 6 Schenck of East Millinocket 55-39, while Jackson Mathers scored 26 points as Southern Aroostook won by nearly the same score, defeating No. 7 Shead of Eastport 56-39.
The two winners will meet in a regional semifinal at 7:05 p.m. Thursday. Southern Aroostook owns two regular-season victories over Fort Fairfield, a 63-59 home win on Dec. 22 and a 57-36 win at Fort Fairfield on Feb. 6.
In the first quarterfinal, Fort Fairfield (16-4) applied a diamond-and-one defense to limit Schenck sophomore standout Justin Thompson to just four points before he fouled out early in the fourth quarter.
Senior Johnny Theriault drew the primary defensive assignment, with sophomore Chris Giberson handling those man-to-man duties when Theriault was out of the game.
“We’ve been working on it hard in practice every day, the kids bought into it real well, and it showed today,” said first-year Fort Fairfield coach Logan McLaughlin. “Theriault did an excellent job on Thompson, Giberson did an excellent job on him, and with the guys in the diamond, their movement and rotations were perfect.”
Watson, the Darling’s/BDN player of the game, scored 17 of his points during the final two quarters while helping the Tigers steadily extend a 23-18 halftime lead. The 6-foot-1 senior also grabbed eight rebounds.
Senior forward Hunter Beaulieu added 11 points — eight in the first half — and 11 rebounds, and classmate Caleb Daigle contributed seven points, seven rebounds and four assists.
“Some games we’ll get out and run a lot more, and other games we’ll end up slowing it down if we get a little lead,” said McLaughlin. “Normally we like to get out and run a little bit, but at the same time, we’ve got Hunter Beaulieu inside who can frustrate teams at times, and we got him a lot of looks early in the game.”
Ryan Leavitt led 15-5 Schenck with 11 points and six rebounds, Chris King scored nine points and Zack Smith had eight points and six rebounds.
In the second game, Shead jumped out to a 5-0 lead, but a quick timeout by veteran Southern Aroostook coach Bill McAvoy served to change the tenor of the game immediately as the Warriors then scored 14 consecutive points to take control.
“Coach said we weren’t even running plays, and we weren’t playing defense,” said Southern Aroostook sophomore center Nolan Altvater. “He told us what to do and brought us back into the game because we were kind of anxious to get on this court.”
Southern Aroostook (19-1) built its lead to double digits at 17-7 by the end of the first period and maintained a cushion of varying degrees thanks in large part to the perimeter pressure of guards Jackson Mathers and Cameron Landry that led to many of Shead’s 26 turnovers during the contest.
“At first we weren’t ready for the game, but we warmed ourselves up as we got to playing a little bit and were able to stop them from scoring,” said Mathers.
Mathers, a sophomore who was named the Darling’s/BDN player of the game, finished with a game-high 26 points to lead Southern Aroostook to its 13th straight win. Altvater added 17 points and six rebounds, and Landry had 10 points and five assists.
Shead (11-9) hung around for much of the afternoon behind the long-range shooting of senior guard Tony Theriault, who canned four 3-pointers while scoring a team-high 19 points. Theriault scored 14 points in the first half as the Tigers stayed within 29-23.
