Huntingdon outlasts Bellefonte

By rscaife
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Updated: December 14, 2016

By Kenny Varner

BELLEFONTE – In their home opener, the Bellefonte boys basketball team battled for three and an a half quarters but it wasn’t quite enough to pull out the victory as it fell to a high intensified Huntingdon team Tuesday night51-39.
Leading the way offensively for Bellefonte was Ben McCartney. McCartney came off the bench to hit two triples and two field goals resulting in a 10-point effort.
The Bearcats tallied three players in double figures. They were Jaylon Smith (10), Jonathan Price(12) and Nick Rigby who scored a game high 15 points in the victory.
“I thought we played a tough 32 minutes.I thought we came out and really completed. For the most part I’m proud of my kids,” said Bellefonte head coach Kris Glunt. “This is a process and we know we have a lot of work to do. But we’re going to find a lot of mini successes in this game and we’re going to keep going forward.”
Going into the final stanza, the red Raiders were within striking distance of the Bearcats, trailing by eight points.
Huntingdon got the stanza going as Jaylon Smith stole the ball from the Bellefonte offense for the easy bucket.
On the following possession, Bellefonte’s Dylan Dietrich hit one-of-two from the charity stripe to drop the lead back to single digits, 39-30.
Huntingdon extended its lead to 15 thanks to a 6-0 run. In that run, Matt Sellers tallied four of his seven points, upping the lead to 45-30.
But the Red Raiders were not ready to give up, rallying back into the contest by going on a 6-0 run of their own, cutting it to 45-37 with 2:33 left in the contest.
However, Bellefonte would run out of time as the Bearcats went on a 6-2 run to end the game with the 12-point victory.
In the first quarter, the Red Raiders came out controlling the ball and dominated the tempo while the Huntingdon offense had to rely on its three-point shooting to stay in the game. The Bearcats plastered four triples.
But the inside game and perimeter game of the Red Raiders looked sharp. Leading the attack was Noah Nadolsky with six points while teammate Cade Fortney chipped in with five, giving Bellefonte a 17-14 advantage.
Huntingdon overturned the momentum in the second as it outscored the home team 10-5, taking a 24-22 lead into the intermission.
The Bearcats continued to string out its lead in the third, taking a 13-7 scoring advantage and a 37-29 lead going into the final eight minutes.
In junior varsity action, Bellefonte won the contest in strong fashion, 54-27.

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