Medfield Boys' Hoops Edged By Norton

It was a typical Tri-Valley League game.

A tough defensive battle, one in which one or two plays decided the outcome.

And it was the  boys’ basketball team that made a few more plays down the stretch to come away with a very hard-fought, 43-41 victory, over Medfield in a league contest on Senior Night at the Lawrence Larocque Gymnasium on Friday night.

The victory, the 9th in the last 11 games for the Lancers, allowed them to complete the league campaign in third place. Norton improved to 15-6 overall and 12-6 in the TVL, while the Warriors dropped to 10-8 both overall and in the league.

Prior to the game, the Lancers honored their seven-member senior class. Forward Tom Munger was the introduced first, followed by guards Malik Little and Brendan Curtin and forward Steve Tessier. The senior captains were then honored, including forward Phil Rizzo, two-guard Joe Wilkes and point-guard Chris Ruta. Rizzo, Wilkes, Tessier, Ruta and Curtin were all in the starting lineup with six of the seven scoring in the game.

“This group of seniors has done a great job keeping the tradition here alive,” said Norton head coach Marc Liberatore. “We lost a lot from last year, but their expectation was to be a tournament team again. From day one, it was all about making the tournament.

“It began during the off-season when the seniors realized it was their time. We have also won a lot of close games this year and that says a lot about our senior leadership.”

Eight Norton players scored in the game with junior forward Colin Feeney leading the way with another double-double, collecting 16 points and 11 rebounds.

Ruta scored nine points and Wilkes had six. Rizzo scored four points and junior guard Steve Burrill had three. Tessier and Curtin both had two points with Little adding one.

Senior guard Ben Coutinho led Medfield with 12 points, while freshman standout and forward Drew Shea had 10. Junior forward Sam Tawa contributed eight points and sophomore guard Johnny McCarthy added five.

During the Tri-Valley League All-Star meeting on Thursday night, Feeney and Wilkes were selected to theTVL All-Star team from Norton, while Shea and Coutinho were selected from Medfield. McCarthy was also named the TVL Sophomore of the Year.

Neither team had a lead of more than six points in the game on Friday. A steal and lay-in by Ruta gave Norton a 34-29 lead with 1:30 remaining in the third quarter. But a basket by Tawa with seven seconds left closed the gap to three at 34-31 at the end of three.

The Warriors scored the first two points of the fourth on a rebound and put back by senior guard Jake Bankert to make it 34-33, 46 seconds in. Medfield would extend the run to 8-2 on baskets by Shea and McCarthy, taking a 37-36 lead with 5:53 left.

Norton would go on a modest 5-2 surge to take a 41-39 lead. A basket by Feeney and later a key three-pointer by Burrill, his only points of the night, gave the hosts a 41-39 advantage with 4:50 left. Tawa would tie the game at 41-41 on a basket with 4:24 remaining, but a basket by Feeney following a key offensive rebound by Rizzo gave Norton the lead for good at 43-41 with 2:04 left. Junior forward Tom Conlon missed a pair of free throws with 1:47 remaining, allowing Norton to maintain its two-point lead.

Feeney later grabbed an important defensive rebound with 42 seconds left, while Burrill did the same on offensive end with 9.8 seconds left. Needing to foul repeatedly to get the Lancers to the line and extend the game, four Warrior fouls chewed 4.3 seconds off the clock before Ruta was finally sent to the line with 5.5 seconds left in the game.

Ruta missed the first free throw with Medfield ending up getting possession of the ball with just 0.7 of a second left on the clock. Tawa attempted to throw a long pass to the other end of the court, but it sailed out of bounds instead. The Lancers were able to inbound the ball and the clock ran out before Medfield was able to foul.

“We made a couple of more plays than they did,” Liberatore said. “We played very solid defense, being able to hold them to 41 points. We didn’t give them a lot of open looks. The great thing about this win is that we were able to get third. The kids really wanted that. If you look at how good this league is, finishing third is a great accomplishment.”

Medfield coach Herb Grace gave credited to Norton making the plays it needed to win despite a strong defensive effort from the Warriors.

“We knew it was going to be a very physical, tough game,” said Grace. "Norton now has 15 wins and is having a very good year. It was a low-scoring game with points being hard to come by. We had issues putting the ball in the basket. Defensively, we held them down. We just couldn’t hit the big shots when we needed to.”

Norton will conclude its regular season with a trip to Martha’s Vineyard for a non-league game on Wednesday afternoon at 4:30 p.m. The Lancers registered a hard-fought 56-53 verdict over Martha’s Vineyard on February 10 at the Larocque Gymnasium.

Medfield will compete in the Foxboro Tournament next week, facing O’Bryant in the first round on Monday at 3 p.m.