Bald Eagle Area boys basketball drops late-game thriller to Huntingdon
Bald Eagle Area sat at 3-7 on the season and fought for a positive performance on Thursday against a 5-7 Huntingdon team in a home matchup.
The game came down to the final 30 seconds. BEA trailed just 58-56 and had a chance to tie following Blaze Angelotti ripping the ball out of the hands of a Huntingdon ball handler and sending possession in his team’s direction. His Eagles teammate, Cam Watkins, caught the ball on the wing and was called for a questionable travel.
It was a step in the right direction for head coach Kris Glunt’s squad, but not the outcome they desired, losing 60-56 in a late-game thriller.
“I’m proud of the kids. I’m disappointed as heck for the kids,” Glunt said. “I thought we deserved to win tonight — a couple of things didn’t go our way. We missed some opportunities, I thought. I think that they [Huntingdon] got some second-chance opportunities offensively that hurt us and we’re kicking ourselves for those.
“We had a couple turnovers that we’d like to have back, but ultimately, we really fought and battled against a really good basketball team. We just came up short.”
Watkins finished as BEA’s leading scorer with 12 points. Trailing him for the Eagles were Angelotti and Tyler Serb, who had 10 points each. Watkins has continued to be an integral member of the team with his hustle on the court and creation of opportunities for points in transition with his sharp instincts.
Despite the outcome, Glunt would like to continue seeing his players — especially Watkins — continue to stay aggressive.
“Cam — he plays a lot of minutes, he plays hard — he’s just a great kid,” Glunt said. “He’s great to coach and you love to see him out here and compete and just be a part of the team and part of the program because he’s such a great kid.
“I’m just really disappointed for these guys. I really feel like we deserved the win and sometimes the ball doesn’t bounce your way or a couple things here or there don’t go your way.”
Huntingdon coach Jordan Fortson was delighted with the effort he saw from his players. He understood that BEA would be a physically strong team in the post and Huntingdon would have to beat in that regard and shoot well from the outside.
The Bearcats had a game-high 21 points from Alec Cooper, Jake Rigby had 12 points and Eli Ehresman had 11 points to close out their victory.
“This was a good game for us because we dropped three of our last four,” Fortson said. “Our last one was probably the worst one we played all season. So, this was a really good game to pull out a tough win to try to get back on track.”
The two teams were locked into a 10-10 standstill at the close of the first quarter. Cooper and Watkins traded shots to lead their team with five points.
BEA led 25-22 at the half with Watkins at 10 points and trailing him was teammate Chase Thompson with seven. Eli Ehresman had a team-high of nine at the half with Cooper at eight.
Cooper began to pull away with a flurry of jumpers in the third quarter to finish with 14 points and took a 40-37 lead into the fourth quarter. His ability to get to the line pushed his team to victory by going 3-for-4 from the line in the final quarter.
Huntingdon 60, Bald Eagle Area 56
HA (6-7): Cooper 21, Rigby 12, Ehresman 11, Norris 6, Moore 4, Bryson 4, Foster 2
BEA (3-8): Watkins 12, Angellotti 10, Serb 10, K. Burns 8, Thompson 7, Gavlock 7, Koleno 2
