The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
’Toppers traverse trail to take down Pirates
A Division II sectional final Feb. 26 between Chardon and Perry was very intense from the opening tip to the final basket.
A 35-30 halftime score indicated this was going to be a close game in the second half.
But the interior defense of the Hilltoppers and their wearing down of the Pirates on the other end of the floor had other ideas. A handful of Nathanael Sulka blocks and Brady Toth blocks led to transition buckets, and Chardon was able to upset the Pirates, 79-66. The Hilltoppers now advance to take on Canfield in a district semifinal.
Coming in as the 14 seed, the odds were stacked against the Hilltoppers to advance to district.
They first had to get over the hurdle of Chagrin Falls on Feb. 23 and were able to pull out a 75-73 win to set up the date with Perry.
Going against the No. 4 seed in the Pirates, many observers would have counted out Chardon. But Chardon was ready for the challenge.
Led by their dynamic duo of Toth and Sulka, Chardon seems to be peaking at the perfect time.
“We were able to get prepared for the playoffs by playing a lot of big Division I teams,” Toth said. “We didn’t start the season off the best, but we were able to pick it up toward the end. These are the real deal games, and we have to win these.”
“We expect Toth and Sulka to step up big for us, but on different nights we have different players that step up and Alex got us going.” Chardon coach Chad Murawski
Sulka added: “We’re playing really good basketball right now, and we just need to keep the ball rolling. It’s win or go home, and we don’t want to be done yet.”
While Sulka and Toth combined for 47 points, 24 and 23 respectively, it took Toth a quarter to get in the flow of the game. While Toth was in a scoring slump for the first eight minutes, Alex Henry stepped up to the plate, scoring 10 points in the first quarter. He finished with 13 points.
“It’s any given night someone will need to step up,” Coach Chad Murawski said. “We expect Toth and Sulka to step up big for us, but on different nights we have different players that step up and Alex got us going. We had major contributions from a lot of guys tonight, and I’m proud of them.”
While it wasn’t the end of the season Perry wanted, the Pirates hung with Chardon for a majority of the game. One thing they couldn’t account for was the size of their opponent. Chardon has players standing at 6-foot-3 and 6-4, while Perry’s tallest player was 6-1. Coach Al Iacofano explained how with being the shorter team, they had to execute everything well and weren’t able to do so.
“They set the tone at the start of the game,” Iacofano said. “They returned their starting five from last year and have been playing good basketball as the season was winding down. We didn’t have the size that they did, and when that’s the case you have to do a lot of the little things well and we weren’t able to do that tonight.”
Leading the way for Perry was Brayden Richards with 27 points, and Jaylen Anderson contributed 24 in his last game for the Pirates.