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The fans who packed the Mineral Point High School gym Thursday night were treated to a great game of basketball between two close SWAL rivals, who were both unbeaten on the year entering the evening.
Just as the Pointers have been doing all season, the #3 ranked team in Division 4's Associated Press poll used a balanced attack to keep Darlington, who had received honorable mention notice in the rankings, at bay 61 to 56 and send the Redbirds back down Highway 23 with their first loss of the season.
The question of the night for Darlington proved to be, who were they going to choose to stop and when? Tarek Oellerich had 14 of his game-high 20 points in the first half, and Sy Staver tallied all of his points in the second half. Toss in Alec Schmitz getting hot from long range, and the Redbirds found themselves with a problem of who to guard.
The first quarter was deadlocked at 14 all. Oellerich tallied the last four Pointer baskets of the period.
The second quarter saw Mineral Point go on an 8-2 run, led by six points from Oellerich again, as the hosts dominated the offensive glass and created a lot of second chance points. Darlington came storming back, however, behind five points from Dane Siegenthaler and a three from Cole McDonald to re-take the lead, but a three from Schmitz with 40 seconds to go gave the Pointers a 25 to 24 lead at the break.
The third quarter was where the Pointers began to distance themselves, compiling a 10-2 stretch to take a 39-29 lead at the 4:09 mark on an old-fashioned three point play from Staver. Although the Redbirds held the Pointers scoreless over the final two minutes, the only field goal they were able to muster came from Chad Golackson as the visitors trailed 44-32 entering the fourth.
Darlington cut the Pointer lead to 56-50 with 2:25 to go in the game on a hoop from Ben Muhlstein, but that would be as close as the Redbirds would get until another Muhlstein bucket right before the last horn made the final score 61-56.
Oellerich led all scorers with his 20 point performance. He was joined in double digits by teammates Staver with 14 and Schmitz with 13.
McDonald was the top Redbird with 13. Right with him were Muhlstein with 12 and Hunter Johnson with 10.
"This was a hard fought win tonight," said Pointer coach Dan Burreson. "There were two pretty good teams going at it."
"Although Sy scored all of his points in the second half, he proved again tonight that he doesn't have to score to get things done. We shared the ball well again as a team, and found whoever was open, especially in the third quarter. This is a team that really does put team first."
"Tarek has had a couple big nights for us, and he got us going in the first half again tonight. I felt as a team we did a good job on the boards all night long, and we got stops when we needed to down the stretch," concluded the coach.
SCORE BY QUARTERS
D: 14-10-8-24--56
MP: 14-11-19-17--61
BOX SCORE
DARLINGTON (fg-ft-tp) 56: Schwartz 1-1/2-3, Siegenthaler 3-0-7, H. Johnson 3-4/5-10, T. Johnson 1-0-2, C. McDonald 5-2/2-13, Muhlstein 5-1/2-12, Whalen 2-1/4-5, Golackson 2-0-4. Totals: 22-9/15-56. Fouls: 17. Fouled out: H. Johnson. Three pointers: C. McDonald 1, Muhlstein 1, Siegenthaler 1.
MINERAL POINT 61: Staver 6-2/6-14, Gorgen 2-1/2-6, Oellerich 9-2/5-20, Poad 2-2/3-6, Schmitz 5-0/1-13, Blume 1-0-2. Totals: 25-7/17-61. Fouls: 13. Fouled out: Gorgen. Three pointers: Schmitz 3, Gorgen 1.