Coming off back-to-back losses to BG and Central, Tyrone flipped the script against the winless Bellwood Antis Blue Devils on Wednesday night, winning by almost 30 points after a slow start.
“It’s nice to get a win against our ‘rivals’ every year,” senior Drew Escala said.
Bellwood kept pace with the Golden Eagles in the first half, with Tyrone holding on to an 8-point advantage at the break.
The Eagles, however, exploded in the third quarter, outscoring Bellwood 19-4 to run the Blue Devils out of their gym with a 63-34 final.
Tyrone Head Coach Luke Rhoades was not happy with how his team started the game but was pleased with their second-half adjustments.
“I thought we came out the first half and didn’t execute well defensively,” Tyrone coach Luke Rhoades told the Altoona Mirror. “I was really happy with the way we responded after halftime. We’ve got to be mentally prepared for every game. I thought Bellwood’s Tyler Mertiff did a great job with his team, and had them ready to go. His game plan was good, tried to slow us down, and took us out of our rhythm.”
Junior Eli Woomer knocked down a pair of threes early in the opening quarter. Woomer scored 16 points to heat up the Eagles offense. Kendall Lehner finished a layup for two of his game-high 25 points to give Tyrone a 17-7 lead after the first quarter.
In the second quarter, Ashton Walk’s jumper gave the Eagles a 13-point lead.
Then Bellwood started to heat up on offense with a pair of threes from Jackson Dorminy and Collin McClellan added a bonus free throw which kept the Devils within eight at 30-22 at the break.
“We talked at halftime about going inside-out,” Coach Luke Rhoades said. “When we had a little bit of a lead in the first half, we were settling for three after three after three after three. Balls not going through the hoop. We took two threes right off the bat and missed them. We went to the basket, and things opened up for us.”
That game plan came to life sooner than later. Lehner buried a 3-pointer, and that’s when the Eagle offense took off. Lehner scored nine during the quarter. Woomer came up with a layup with under four in the quarter as Tyrone took a 49-26 lead after the third quarter.
Tyrone outscored Bellwood 33-12 in the second half to put the game out of reach for the Blue Devils.
TYRONE (63): Escala 1 2-2 4, Walk 2 1-4 5, Woomer 6 0-0 16, Lehner 11 2-4, Adams 0 0-0 0, Crilly 2 1-2 5, Hamer 4 0-0 8, Rudden 0 0-0 0, Parsons 0 0-0 0, Gwinn 0 0-0 0, Dasher 0 0-0 0, Harpster 0 0-0 0. Totals: 26 6-12 63.
BELLWOOD-ANTIS (34): Gibbons 1 0-0 2, Mayes 3 0-2 8, H. Schreier 0 0-0 0, Simmons 0 0-0 0, Dorminy 6 3-4 18, McClellan 2 2-3 6, Fatzinger 0 0-0 0, Worthing 0 0-0 0, Bardell 0 0-0 0, McConnell 0 0-0 0, Litzinger 0 0-0 0. Totals: 12 5-9 34.
SCORE BY QUARTERS
Tyrone 17 13 19 14 – 63
Bellwood-Antis 7 15 4 8 – 34
3-point goals: Tyrone 5 (Woomer 4, Lehner), Bellwood-Antis 5 (Mayes 2, Shanafelt 3)
Records: Tyrone (9-2), Bellwood-Antis (0-11).
JV: Tyrone, 62-42. High scorers: Gwinn, T, 25; Shanafelt, B-A, 10
