By Jordan Burton (For OzarksSportsZone.com)
For 16 minutes Mountain Grove was about as flat as you’ll see the Panthers play, especially on a stage like the Blue and Gold Tournament.
The No. 2 seed in the Blue Bracket trailed 28-26 at the half following a buzzer-beating 3-point field goal by Willow Springs senior Bryce Duddridge.
He scored 13 points in the opening half.
“We came out flat but a lot of that had to do with Willow,” said Mountain Grove coach Duane Hiler. “They did a good job of slowing us down and changing the tempo of the game. We’re not a half court team and it’s not a secret.
“I didn’t feel we were playing hard, I didn’t feel we were executing and tip your cap to Willow because they made big shot after big shot. In the second half we got our intensity back and our focus… We made some changes at halftime, we’ll just call it that.”
Those adjustments allowed Grove to outscore Willow Springs 46-23 in the second half, controlling the tempo and forcing the game into a helter-skelter pace.
That style, which has been a staple of Mountain Grove’s back-to-back Final Four runs, featured a steady dose of the following sequence:
Rebound
Outlet to senior guard Carter Otwell
Otwell advance pass to classmates Cade Coffman or Connor McNew
Score
Coffmann and McNew each scored 20 points.
CLICK HERE FOR PHOTOS OF THE GAME
“We’ve kinda been blessed, the last couple of years especially, with Treye and Carter to have someone that is fast but also good at breaking people down and reading the floor,” said Hiler. “It opens us up and we kind of feed off of it. When that gets going our defense gets a little better and we start getting run outs.”
Mountain Grove also did a much better job defending Duddridge in the second half, holding one of the SCA’s best scorers to just one point in the second half. Landon Rogers added 10 for the Bears.
Dylan Massey joined Coffman and McNew in double figures with 16 points. Coffman, who has scored 50 points in two games so far, is on pace to become the 23rd player to score 100 points in a single tournament.
Grove will now see Kickapoo in the semifinals. The Chiefs “upset” No. 3 Strafford in the quarterfinals, 59-53. It’s the second time in the last three years that the Panthers have reached the semifinals of the event.
And – after coming up just short in 2015 against Nixa (66-62) – Hiler is confident his bunch will be more composed this time around.
“The one thing you can’t do is make the game bigger than what it is, you have to approach it the same way you would any other game,” said Hiler. “When you do that you keep your focus. You don’t want to come in all jacked up, foul out in the first quarter and break a backboard or something. This group is pretty seasoned, they’ve been to the Final Four twice and they’ve seen some big talent up there, I think they’ll stay grounded and focused.”
Mtn. Grove 72, Willow Springs 51
Mtn. Grove 13 13 17 29 — 72
Willow Springs 11 17 9 14 — 51
Mtn. Grove – Cade Coffman 20, Connor McNew 20, Dylan Massey 16, Carter Otwell 8, John Felker 3, Bryce Lauderdale 2, Dawson Hiler 2, Heyden Newberry 1
Willow Springs – Bryce Duddridge 14, Landon Rogers 10, Michael Cawvey 8, Trey Talbert 8, Tryton Henley 5, Ryan Tompkins 4, Ryan Cawvey 2
