RANDY HISNER
WZBD.com
A stifling Bellmont defense held New Haven to single-digit scoring in each of the final two quarters Friday night, keying a 62-47 win for the Braves in their NE8 opener.
New Haven’s Lavell Ledbetter hit a three-quarter-court shot at the end of the first half to send the Bulldogs (1-5) to the locker room with a 32-31 lead, but the Braves (6-1) came back with a 13-8 edge in the third quarter to go ahead 44-40.
Then Bellmont dominated the fourth quarter, 18-7, to seal the win, their fourth in a row.
Bellmont coach Payton Selking admired the Braves’ fourth-quarter performance. “That’s a toughness thing,” he said. “We’ve talked about it since May. We lost a lot of close games last year. I think we were 4-9 in single-digit games. That was one of our keys before the game. It’s not easy to win here.”
History backs that statement up. It was the first Bellmont victory at New Haven since December of 2005.
The teams battled to a 17-17 deadlock in the first quarter, the Braves getting six points each from Jack Scheumann and Gavin Krull.
The second quarter saw nine lead changes. The biggest lead of the quarter was the Braves’ early 22-19 advantage after a five-point run on Kord Fuelling’s putback and a three-pointer from the top of the key by Andrew James. Job Hoffman came off the bench to give the Braves a boost in the period, hitting one of two free throws at the 2:22 mark and then converting an old-fashioned three-point play with 29 seconds to go, putting Bellmont up, 28-27.
Jeremiah Cottrell hit a fast break layup a few seconds later to give New Haven the lead again, but Scheumann countered with a long three-pointer from the left wing with five seconds on the clock, and the Braves were up two at 31-29. That’s when Ledbetter hit his desperation heave.
Bellmont coach Payton Selking liked how Ledbetter’s unlikely buzzer-beater didn’t deflate his squad. “After they throw in a three-quarter-court shot to end the half, it would have been easy to feel bad for ourselves and kind of limp our way through the second half, keep it close and lose by six or eight but, man, we handled the adversity as well as I could have hoped,” he said.
Scheumann, who led all scorers with 21 points, scored eight points in the third quarter, and Krull added his third three-pointer of the game as the Braves built a slim four-point lead going into the final period.
Krull threw a bullet pass from out front to James under the bucket for a layup to open the fourth quarter. Fuelling followed with a pair of free throws, and then Scheumann hit a drive on the left side, giving the Braves their first double-digit lead at 50-40.
Cottrell got it back to seven with a three-point play on the Bulldogs’ next possession, but Bellmont went on an 11-2 run in the next four minutes to put the game out of reach. Krull hit his fourth three during the rally, and Dylan Velez added a pair of buckets underneath, one coming after a slick pass from Fuelling in traffic.
“We’re just lacking scoring,” New Haven coach Bruce Stephens said of his team’s second-half difficulties. “We went into halftime with the lead, but we knew we needed to score more.” The Bulldogs were without leading score Ajani Washington (19.5 ppg), but Stephens refused to use that as an excuse. “You know what? You still got to play the game,” he said.
“We gave them too many second-chance points,” he added. “We didn’t block out. They got a lot of offensive rebounds. They were real scrappy.”
Stephens relies heavily on several young players. Three of the eight Bulldogs who scored are freshmen, and another is a sophomore.
New Haven outshot Bellmont on two-pointers, going 17-for-30 (57%), while the Braves were 11-for-23 (48%). The Braves’ advantages came from three-point land (35% on 7-for-20 versus 23% for New Haven on 3-for-13) and at the free throw line (73% on 16-for-22 versus New Haven’s 30% on 3-for-10).
Krull finished with 14 points, James with 12. Fuelling had six, Hoffman five, Velez four. Cottrell led New Haven with 13. Devin White added eight, and freshman Marquaylon Johnson scored seven.
New Haven overcame a 28-20 third-quarter deficit to win the JV game 38-34. Maddux Miller led the Braves with 20 points. Easton Curtis added seven. Hunter Barrand scored 14 for New Haven.
The Braves will travel to Adams Central next Friday to take on the Flying Jets. That game will be broadcast live on WZBD.