3/14 - Ironton 47 Wheelersburg 29 - (District Championship)

[ohbuckeye2]

#5 Ironton takes on #11 Wheelersburg for the District Championship, thoughts?


District Semi Finals

#5 Ironton ---- 48
#1 Valley ------ 39

#11 Wheelersburg -- 44
#10 Waverly --------- 38

Ironton won the regular season matchup on 2/3 by the score of 59-49

[philthyphil]

I like Ironton's chances of making it to the Regionals. Took down Wheelersburg once and I see no reason why they cannot do it again. Hopeful for a better start to the game than against Valley.

[4thgoal]

A battle between pfloyd's #19 vs #41 to advance to the regionals. Wheelersburg will have to shoot the ball much better to advance, but they have been finding ways to keep winning. Both teams have beat 2 higher seeded teams so far in the tournament and I am hoping Burg finds a way to make it 3! Not many people expected Burg to be in this position and to be the last SOCII team standing, but they have taken advantage of a couple upsets along the way.

GO PIRATES!

[so.stormmom]

Score will depend on how long lefon keeps his starters in

[so.stormmom]

This game will show why they are 41 in p,s ranking

[4thgoal]

This game will show why they are 41 in p,s ranking

None of the rankings mean anything at this point, both teams are 3-0 in the new season. I was just pointing out that neither of these teams were favorites or expected to be playing in the district finals. I would venture to guess that most people felt this district final would be Valley vs. Zane Trace or Alexander. Burg and Ironton have a lot of experience and history at the Convo and this should be a good game, but neither team is as high quality as they have had over the past 10 years. There aren't the big names like Stegman, Spradlin, Miller, Gagai, Carter, Fletcher....you get the drift.

[bbjunky81]

A battle between pfloyd's #19 vs #41 to advance to the regionals. Wheelersburg will have to shoot the ball much better to advance, but they have been finding ways to keep winning. Both teams have beat 2 higher seeded teams so far in the tournament and I am hoping Burg finds a way to make it 3! Not many people expected Burg to be in this position and to be the last SOCII team standing, but they have taken advantage of a couple upsets along the way.

GO PIRATES!

Wheelersburg has beaten a #6 seed (who kicked off a 28 ppg scorer a week before the game), a #14 seed who had won 2 games all year, and a #10 seed (who they had already beaten twice in the season). I mean, yeh, I guess they have beaten "two higher seeds" but even Waverly was only seeded higher because they were in the other bracket.

To give them some credit, they were clearly the favorite in all 3 matchups and were able to pull out a win in each.


As for the game, Ironton should win this one but even they are no world beaters. I'll go:

Ironton 55
Burg 48

[Old Bulldog]

The Pirates are not be the prettiest Cinderella team but they usually make their opponents play ugly anyway so it doesn't matter. Most of Wheelersburg's opponents say that they didn't play well against them win or lose. That is a Coach Ater team. They scrap, claw, hustle and work out there. Wheelersburg does the little things and sometimes they equal out to a win. They are definitely the underdog in this game. No one ever dreamed you'd get this far Pirates so leave it on the court and see what happens. It's not midnight just yet!
Go Burg.

[smurray]

Waverly was 9 for 23 from the line against Burg in the District semi. Not sure they can play defense against a guy shooting foul shots, nothing they can do to defend it. They can't scrap and claw and hustle around the foul line.
Should Waverly make a majority of those freebies they win. Some of those misses were front ends of one and ones. Most of the misses came in the second half, mainly in the 3rd period (8 misses) when Waverly totally outplayed the Pirates and took the lead at the end of 3 after trailing by 5 at the break. Even in the 4th Waverly had the chance to pull away, increase their lead, but failed at the line. Waverly beat Waverly at the foul line.

[bbjunky81]

Waverly was 9 for 23 from the line against Burg in the District semi. Not sure they can play defense against a guy shooting foul shots, nothing they can do to defend it. They can't scrap and claw and hustle around the foul line.
Should Waverly make a majority of those freebies they win. Some of those misses were front ends of one and ones. Most of the misses came in the second half, mainly in the 3rd period (8 misses) when Waverly totally outplayed the Pirates and took the lead at the end of 3 after trailing by 5 at the break. Even in the 4th Waverly had the chance to pull away, increase their lead, but failed at the line. Waverly beat Waverly at the foul line.

As a neutral fan who was there, I agree whole heartedly. Waverly had a gazillion chances to win but shooting 39% from the line lost them the game.

And I'm not saying Waverly was solid or played great in any other facet --- they looked rough all around. But it was definitely one of the worst free throw performances I've ever seen.

[jottings]

Have to root for GAHS opponent Ironton in this one.

[Futurebkstar]

I think Dylan Malone will be the x-factor in this game for Ironton. His athleticism on the boards and around the basket will be the difference. I counted 9 first half rebounds for him coming off the bench during the district semi game.

[sballchck]

This will be a VERY physical game, which will result in a lot of fouls.

Ironton is deeper and will have more fouls to give. Also Ironton is an extremely good foul shooting team.

I think the Pirates will play tough, but the Fighting Tigers will win this game at the Free Throw Line.

[rockbiter]

I'll go with Ironton in this one. But, Wheelersburg will make a game of it.

[juanmorales]

I predict another boring D3 game. More than likely i'll sleep through the first 30 minutes and wake up for the final 2 minutes. Both teams offensively challenged...taking Ironton in this one with a final score we used to see in the 1920s. 12-6

[D4hero]

This might be one of the worst D3 years I've seen in SE Ohio in the last 10-20 years.. Wheelersburg in a district final? Wow. This same Ironton team only won like 3-4 games last year mind you. Down, down year. I would take D4 Peebles and D4 Trimble over any D3 team this year.

In lighter news, the two SE Ohio teams play in Regional semifinals so either Chesapeake or Portsmouth will be in the Regional Final.. So they will have A SHOT to get out, but they're going to run into pretty solid competition there.

[ohbuckeye2]

Good luck Fighting Tigers!!

[ohbuckeye2]

This might be one of the worst D3 years I've seen in SE Ohio in the last 10-20 years.. Wheelersburg in a district final? Wow. This same Ironton team only won like 3-4 games last year mind you. Down, down year. I would take D4 Peebles and D4 Trimble over any D3 team this year.

In lighter news, the two SE Ohio teams play in Regional semifinals so either Chesapeake or Portsmouth will be in the Regional Final.. So they will have A SHOT to get out, but they're going to run into pretty solid competition there.

If I'm not mistaken (which I'm not) Ironton split with Portsmouth and took Chesapeake to OT this year.

[Old Bulldog]

Waverly was 9 for 23 from the line against Burg in the District semi. Not sure they can play defense against a guy shooting foul shots, nothing they can do to defend it. They can't scrap and claw and hustle around the foul line.
Should Waverly make a majority of those freebies they win. Some of those misses were front ends of one and ones. Most of the misses came in the second half, mainly in the 3rd period (8 misses) when Waverly totally outplayed the Pirates and took the lead at the end of 3 after trailing by 5 at the break. Even in the 4th Waverly had the chance to pull away, increase their lead, but failed at the line. Waverly beat Waverly at the foul line.

Oh, Smurray you're forgetting about the mental aspect of free throw shooting. Those Waverly kids knew that once they were done shooting free throws the Pirates were going to hustle, scrap and claw against them and they weren't able to concentrate on their foul shots!! :122245

[ohbuckeye2]

1st QTR 4:06

Ironton --------- 5
Wheelersburg - 1