CHARLESTON, W. Va. – A drought of rebounding in the first half and a Tucker County defense that held Brandon Burgraff to a 7 of 20 field goal performance resulted in the Matewan Tigers historic season coming to an end as they fell 65 – 57 to a Tucker County Mountain Lion team that came ready to play.

The usually rebounding superior Tigers were outdone on both the offensive and defensive boards and never were able to break away from Tucker County. During a game which saw the score tied eight times and the lead change hands 9 times, the largest lead the Tigers got in this one was a 3 point first quarter lead.

The Tigers rebounding and scoring game took a hit early when senior center Matt Kennedy was forced to the bench with his third foul midway through the 2nd period. Kennedy scored no points in the first half for Matewan and only collected 3 rebounds.

“This was the best defensive team we’ve played all year” said senior forward Colton Copley after the game. Copley, usually a double-double candidate, was held to only four rebounds in each period. He did turn out to be the game’s leading scorer with 22 points.

The first period was neck and neck as both teams sought to feel out the other. The first quarter ended in an 18 to 18 tie as Tucker County’s Ethan Slaubaugh hit a three pointer from half court to tie it up.

 The second quarter was a battle as both teams pressed the issue on the boards. With Kennedy on the bench however, Tucker County was able to control the middle and exploit the hole to take several trips inside to the basket.

Brandon Burgraff of Matewan and the Mountain Lion’s Slaubaugh spent much of the period exchanging shots. Burgraff had 12 points in the half while Slaubaugh finished with 13 points in the first half. Logan Snyder also had 12 first half points for Tucker Co. as well. Tucker outscored Matewan 13 to 11 in the period. That left the halftime score as Tucker County 31, Matewan 29.

At the half, Coach Phillip Mitchell told his team they needed to play their game. “Coach told us we needed to come out from the start and play like we always do” commented Kennedy of the Matewan halftime session. Tucker County Coach 
Tom Gushalt took a little different approach, deciding to make a defensive adjustment. “We moved Dillard over to cover Burgraff and Logan Snyder to cover the other one and I think that was a move that took Burgraff out of his game a little more. I thought Darius did an excellent job of covering Burgraff that second half.”

The Tigers though came out hot in the third period with Kennedy and Copley putting six points on the board in the first 1:27 seconds of the period to make it 35 – 33 Matewan leading with 6:33 remaining in the period.

After a media timeout however at the 5:17 remaining mark, it was all Tucker County for the rest of the frame as they outscored the Tigers 10 to 2 during the final five minutes in the third. Tucker County’s Josh Poling scored six during that run and Darius Dillard scored four. The Mountain Lions took a 43 to 37 lead into the fourth period.

With the “Matewan Green Maniacs” re-defining the definition of “spirited cheering” as a result of their high volume cheering, the Tigers came out in the fourth in an unrelenting fashion, attempting to catch up on the scoreboard. Kennedy and Copley took over the Matewan offense when Burgraff was sent to the bench for a few minutes with a minor ankle injury.

Copley collected 10 of his game high 22 points and Kennedy collected 8 of his game total of 12 points in the fourth quarter. In fact, 22 of Matawan’s 34 second half points came from inside the paint. But it was not enough as they were able to narrow the lead to two points at the 4:00 remaining point but got no closer than that for the remainder of the contest. Tucker County outscored Matewan 22 to 20 in the fourth quarter with the final score being Tucker County 65, Matewan 57.

“They’re a good team that plays good defense.” said Matewan Head Coach Phillip Mitchell during the post-game press conference. “They played us tough and we just came up a little short.”

“People up our way have questioned the competition level of the teams in the southern part of the state. But I’ve got news for them.” said Gushalt. “This teams the real deal…Matewan’s as good a team as they come. They’ve got a nice package there and they are solid.”

“It hurt us when Matt got in foul trouble early and we had to bring him out. We lost out not only on the rebounding end, but the scoring end too” commented Mitchell. And they were able to push Brandon back a little further and that took him out of his comfort zone shooting wise and that hurt us on the scoreboard too.”

“We were able to shut Poling down pretty good in the first half. I think he got maybe four points. But he started getting hot and we just didn’t do a good job of containing him after that.” said Mitchell. “But Slaubaugh did well for them too.”

“Colton did an excellent job for us today. He’s a great young man as are all of these guys”said Mitchell. “But then again that’s what we’ve done all season…if one guy was not having a good game, somebody else always steps up. Today, we just got outplayed a little bit.”

When asked if the early morning time slot hurt them, Kennedy explained that “it really wasn’t a factor. You’ve just got to play and today they played a little better.”

Being reflective, Burgraff said it will always be a great memory. “We guys, all of us on this team, had never gotten this far before so it will always be a great memory. Especially the way our fans and community came out today and supported us.

Matewan brought two full bus loads of fans to the game. “That’s a tremendous compliment to our team by our community that we’re awfully proud of” said Mitchell. “We appreciate all the support we’ve been given.”

Matewan finishes with a season record of 23 – 3. Tucker County, now with a record of

23 – 4 will take on the winner of the Charleston Catholic –Pocahontas County match-up on Friday.

Scoring by Periods:

Matewan 18 11 8 20 - 57

Tucker County 18 13 12 22 - 65

Scoring by Team:

Matewan (23-3): Colton Copley 22, Brandon Burgraff 16, Matt Kennedy 12, Josh Sammons 3, Nathaniel Mitchell 2,Chaz Clusky 2, Max Whitt 0.

Tucker County (23-4): Josh poling 20, Ethan Slaubaugh 18, Logan Snyder 16, Darius Dillard 6, Dylan Simmons 4, Casey Phillips 1, Patrick Myers 0.

Free Throw Shooting:

Matewan 6 of 10 = 60%

Tucker Co. 13 of 22 = 59.1%