Montgomery turns back East Brunswick in semis

http://www.mycentraljersey.com/article/20140308/NJSPORTS0150/303080034/Montgomery-turns-back-East-Brunswick-semis

With a trip to the NJSIAA Central Group IV finals on the line, the Montgomery and East Brunswick boys basketball teams laid it all out on the floor on Saturday afternoon.

A pair of seniors came up clutch in the final minute for the top-seeded Cougars, as Chase Ta and Justin Kovacevich collectively went 6-of-6 from the free throw line in the final 27.3 seconds as Montgomery held on for a 47-46 win over the fifth-seeded and defending sectional champion Bears and will host second-seeded Trenton in the sectional finals on Tuesday.

“It was just two really, really good teams battling it out and we were fortunate to come out on the plus side today,” Montgomery coach Kris Grundy said. “I just kept telling them that this is our time.”

“It’s what we expected this game to be,” said Ta, who scored seven of his 14 points in the fourth quarter while Kovacevich scored a team-high 15 points in the win. “It’s not gonna be a blowout, it was gonna be a grind out game, we’ve been practicing it the past couple of days, and it just worked out for us.”

The ending though didn’t come without a little bit of controversy.

After Kovacevich hit both ends of a 1-and-1 with 10.4 seconds left to put Montgomery (27-1) up 47-43, East Brunswick (19-7) came up the court looking for a miracle down four with no timeouts left.

Sophomore guard Matt Ross came up with a loose ball on the floor for the Bears and heaved a desperation 3-pointer from the right wing with about three seconds left.

His shot swished in while he drew a good amount of contact from leaping defender Darron Wallace, but a whistle never blew and the game ended as East Brunswick was irate.

“I thought he got hit pretty hard, but I guess they don’t like to call those calls late, but when it’s that hard of a foul, I thought they should have blown the whistle so you saw I was aggravated,” East Brunswick coach Mark Motusesky said. “Besides that, we had a lot of opportunities to win the game late and we just didn’t make plays. We missed some easy baskets, we gave some easy baskets up late like we don’t normally do, so that’s where we lost the game.”

The no call at the end had Montgomery relieved.

“And there was a lot of contact with that too, so I got scared the ref was gonna call it but luckily (East Brunswick) didn’t have any timeouts left,” Ta said.

East Brunswick never led other than one sequence early in the third quarter, but had its chances late.

With Montgomery holding a 39-36 lead for over a three minute stretch in the fourth quarter, Princeton-bound senior point guard Amir Bell finished a strong drive to the hole and was fouled, but missed a game-tying free throw as the Bears remained down, 39-38.

Ta drove the length of the court and finished a baseline drive with 42 seconds left to put Montgomery up 41-38 after East Brunswick had multiple chances to take the lead.

Garry Baumer missed a 3 on the other end for East Brunswick and Ta converted both ends of a 1-and-1 with 27.3 second to put Montgomery up 43-38.

Ross buried a 3 with 18 seconds left to bring East Brunswick within two before Ta again hit both ends of a 1-and-1 to put the Cougars up 45-41 with 16.4 seconds left.

Bell connected on a quick drive down the lane with 11 seconds left to make it a two-point game again before Kovacevich converted on his 1-and-1, which gave Montgomery the 45-41 lead with 10.4 seconds.

“Once you get the lead it’s a sigh of relief, it puts the pressure back on Montgomery, and we didn’t get that lead like we needed to,” Motusesky said.

Bell was East Brunswick’s only player to score in double figures finished with 15 points, as Timmy Youreneff held East Brunswick’s 3-point threat Baumer without a field goal and to only two points.

“Timmy came in to watch film with me on Friday, and I said to him we’re thinking about denying Baumer the ball all over the court and without even thinking he goes ‘I can do that coach,’ and I go ‘it’s your job man’ and he basically played 32 minutes today, didn’t allow Baumer to get into anything,” Grundy said.

Now Montgomery will get a Trenton team on its home court that’s knocked them out of the state tournament two of the past three seasons.

“Trenton’s been kind of my nemesis,” Grundy said. “It’s nice to get them to come here. This place is gonna be rocking, it’s gonna be packed.”