Margaretta holds off Bellevue for win in season opener

BELLEVUE — With about five and a half minutes remaining and Margaretta leading by a point, the Polar Bears turned up their patience. For the next minute or so, they worked the ball around the perimeter, protecting it but not looking to shoot. When Jake Leibacher took possession at the top of the key, though, he attacked. It hadn't been a phenomenal night for the senior star, but on this play he drove to his weaker left, beat his man off the dribble and held off a help defender for a lefty finish off glass and the foul. He made the free throw to go up four with a little over four minutes left. "This wasn't his best night," Margaretta coach Steve Keller said. "But he kept competing... Any time you have a possession like that and get not only a basket but an and-1, that's huge. I was pleased with how we closed out the game." Margaretta (1-0) had just enough of those types of plays to hold off Bellevue (0-1) in a season opener for both teams on Saturday night as the Polar Bears pulled out a 56-48 win. Leibacher finished with 16 points, seven rebounds, five assists and three blocks. His classmate Ben Palomo scored 11 points with eight rebounds and four steals, and Hayden Wiley added 10 points of his own. "It's a great win," Palomo said. "It was a good team, and we just pulled it out." Bellevue was led by 11 points apiece from Tyler Ray and Deegan Horn, while Ryan Mohr added nine. "We've got some competitors on our team," Bellevue coach Ed Rich said. "We did some good things, did some bad things. It was a typical first game, really." Saturday's matchup was one pitting the proven — a Margaretta team with its top four scorers back — against the unproven — a young Bellevue group with tantalizing length but equal amounts inexperience. The Redmen acquitted themselves well. After Margaretta jumped out to a 14-8 lead in the first quarter, Bellevue hung around. The 6-foot-7 Mohr dished to Ethan Stewart for an and-1. Then Mohr scored twice consecutively, the second on a slick feed from Horn. A 7-0 run for Bellevue in the second quarter tied the game at 24. "Mohr, he's gotten a lot better," Keller said. "He's really improved at finishing. Shoot, he stepped out and hit a 3 in the corner." "(Mohr) put a ton of work in this spring, this fall, this summer," Rich said. "Tonight, at first he was a little shaky trying to get a feel for the varsity game. But by quarters two, three and four, I thought he played like a man." But Margaretta closed the half with consecutive 3-pointers from Gage Bodey, including one from the left wing at the buzzer, to go up 30-25 at the break. Bellevue kept chipping away in the second half, but the Polar Bears wouldn't let the home team pull in front. Mohr scored inside to get within one, but then Wiley hit a 3 at the other end. An Ashton Martin three-point play tied the game at 37 moments later, but then Leibacher found Wiley for a layup. "I like the way (Wiley) plays," Palomo said. "It helps us out a lot. It's a big step up from last year." Horn went on to tie the game at 39, but then Leibacher sprinted around an off-ball speed for a dish from Palomo for two. And the teams traded a pair of points apiece before the end of the third, a 43-41 Polar Bears lead heading to the final quarter. The first three and a half minutes of the fourth featured just one point, a Bellevue free throw, before Leibacher's three-point play. "We defended (Leibacher) well for three, three and a half quarters," Rich said. "He got his there toward the end. He's just an excellent player." A minute later, Leibacher sealed off his defender in the lane for an entry pass from Wiley and a simple turnaround finish to go up five. And then Leibacher found Palomo over the top for a layup, giving Margaretta a seven-point lead that would essentially wrap the game up. "We've had good chemistry all of our lives," Palomo said. "We've been playing basketball together since fourth grade, so usually when I rim run, (Leibacher) throws it up." Saturday's win was the kind of game Margaretta will need to pull out if it's to reach its goal of an SBC Bay Division title. Leibacher didn't dominate. Bellevue's press and length both caused occasional problems. But the Polar Bears found enough timely buckets and stops to seize victory. For opening night, that works just fine for Margaretta. "I just was pleased with how we got stops late and I was pleased with our competitive nature," Keller said. "I think that's the two biggest things that we can go and really stress as positives, and we'll work on the other things." --- MARGARETTA Gage Bodey 2 0-0 6, Cameron Sosa 1 4-4 6, Nathan Schaefer 2 0-0 5, Colson Biehl 0 2-2 2, Jake Leibacher 5 6-9 16, Ben Palomo 5 0-0 11, Hayden Wiley 3 3-3 10. TOTALS 18 15-18 56 BELLEVUE Ethan Stewart 2 1-3 6, Ashton Martin 3 2-3 8, Tyler Ray 4 2-4 11, Deegan Horn 4 1-2 1, Mason Treat 1 1-1 3, Ryan Mohr 4 0-2 9. TOTALS 18 7-15 48 Margaretta 14 16 13 13 — 56Bellevue 8 17 16 7 — 48 Three-point goals — Margaretta 5 (Bodey 2, Schaefer 1, Palomo 1, Wiley 1); Bellevue 5 (Horn 2, Stewart 1, Ray 1, Mohr 1)