BLACKSVILLE — It seemed like the entire town of Blacksville was at Clay-Battelle High School Thursday night to watch their homestanding Cee-Bees punch their ticket to the state tournament with a 67-59 win over Madonna.
The standing-room-only crowd loudly supported their Cee-Bees throughout the wire-to-wire win that ended with a Class A Region I co-championship and a trip to Charleston next week.
“At the beginning of the year, we knew we had really good potential, but we play a really tough section and a really tough region,” senior Carson Shriver said after the game. “At the end of the day, we got it done and that win feels great for us seniors. It’s the last time going out there on our home court and we got it done.”
The matchup between Clay-Battelle (19-6) and Madonna (14-11) was a rematch of the regular-season finale, which the Cee-Bees won in overtime in Weirton after erasing an 18-point deficit in the second half. Thursday’s game was much less dramatic as the home team led throughout.
“It was a great atmosphere for basketball,” CB coach Josh Kisner said. “In a small community like this, they really come together, they’re excited and they come out and support (the team) 100%. It makes the boys play harder.”
It was once again the Cee-Bees’ size inside that made the difference as forwards Colby Barr and Preston Luzader both finished with double-doubles. Barr, a junior, scored a game-high 24 points and had 10 rebounds while Luzader, a sophomore, finished with 20 points and pulled down 16 boards.
“They battled through adversity,” Shriver said. “They’re only a sophomore and a junior, I’m really proud of those guys. They really stepped up on a big stage.”
“They’re just phenomenal ballplayers,” Kisner added. “They do a great job of sharing the basketball with one another and with Matthew (Gadd) in there. Our outside shooting wasn’t phenomenal (Thursday), but it’ll come around.”
Luzader said the biggest difference between their game against Madonna two weeks ago and Thursday’s was that the Cee-Bees were much better prepared defensively.
“I feel like we weren’t very prepared for them at first,” He said, “We were more prepared this time for them and we had a defense that was ready for them.”
Anthony Mascio, who scored more than 30 points in the first meeting, was held to 17 points Thursday and other than Santo DoBraska’s 20, no other Blue Dons reached double figures.
“We know they’re a tough ballclub, they’ve got a bunch of great scorers,” Shriver added. “We knew if we could stop (Mascio) and hold everybody else to a minimum amount of points, we could get the job done and that’s what we did.”
Clay-Battelle scored a couple of late baskets to lead 17-14 at the end of the first quarter and pushed it to a 32-25 advantage at halftime.
“We had that early lead coming out (of halftime) and we knew he could slow the ball down,” Shriver said. “They were going to try to tempo us. We knew that if we slow the game down and run our offense we’re going to score buckets because we’ve got mismatches everywhere.”
CB was again solid in the third and led 48-35 entering the final frame. An eight-point run early in the fourth gave Clay-Battelle a 56-42 lead and looked to put the game away, but Madonna struck right back with an eight-point run of their own to cut the deficit back to single digits.
“Same intensity, this was just as physical as it was up there (in Weirton),” Kisner said. “The big difference is we got out to a better start (Thursday). Out there, we were down 18 and it was just a fight to get back in.”
CB sank 15 of 20 free throws in the fourth quarter to hang on for the win.
Clay-Battelle out-rebounded their visitors 33-10 behind the efforts of Barr and Luzader. Shriver finished third for CB with nine points and senior Kholton Sr. Clair added eight with both of the team’s three-pointers.
This will be Clay-Battelle’s second state tournament in three years after qualifying in 2021 and just their third this millennium, also going in 2014.
“When we posted the schedule at the start of the year, we didn’t know what was going to happen,” Kisner said. “To be 19-6 right now feels pretty good.”
“Being a sophomore down there (in 2021), I really didn’t get to play much,” Shriver said. “We had a great senior class and we know we have to step up now. We’re the seniors and we’ve got to lead by example, lead with our voices.”
Clay-Battelle is the No. 4 seed in the Class A tournament and will play No. 5 Webster County in the quarterfinal round Tuesday at 11:15 a.m.
Clay-Battelle 67, Madonna 59
Mad 14 11 10 24 — 59
CB 17 15 16 19 — 67
Madonna — Amaismeier 3 1-2 7; Mascio 6 0-0 17; DoBraska 7 3-4 20; Muzzi 2 1-2 5; Littleton 1 7-10 9; Gontas 0 0-0 0; Connors 0 0-0 0; Miller 0 0-0 0; Molnar 0 0-0 0.
CB — Shriver 3 3-7 9; St. Clair 2 2-3 8; Barr 9 6-9 24; Luzader 6 8-8 20; Gadd 1 0-0 2; Kolat 0 0-0 0; Payton 1 2-2 4; Spears 0 0-0 0; Ponceroff 0 0-0 0.
3 Pt. Goals — Madonna 8 (Mascio 5, DoBraska 3). Clay-Battelle 2 (St. Clair 2).
TWEET @CodyNespor
