By SPENCER BATES
OLEAN — Olean boys basketball coach Tim Kolasinski knew that his team’s opponent in the Section 6 Class A2 Quarterfinal, Lewiston-Porter, was going to shoot the ball well.
And while he didn’t fully anticipate the deluge of 3s that the Lancers managed to rain down, his Huskies did what they needed to in the clutch moments to escape with a 59-56 win.
The high-octane shooting performance by Lew-Port got going in the early minutes of the game, running up an 11-4 score and forcing an early Olean timeout, after which the Huskies managed to lock in defensively and close the quarter on a 10-0 run.
But the Lancer’s dedication to the 3 ball was not shaken after some misfires. In fact, it was the 14 3-pointers the team combined for that kept them in the game and gave them an opportunity to swipe a win late on.
Olean held a 10-point lead over Lew-Port going into the final frame, but as Kolasinski knew, that was not an insurmountable total for the visitors based on the way they had been shooting. And while ultimately, his side was able to withstand the barrage, he gave credit to the Lancers and their deep-ball proficiency.
“(Lew-Port) hit (a 3) going into the fourth quarter that made it a 10 point game, and as you’re looking up at that board, you know, because of their ability to shoot, that this game is far, far from over,” Kolasinski said. “When they come out and shoot it the way that they did, it’s just unbelievable. … That’s got to be one of the best shooting performances I can ever remember.”
Olean’s Mykel Rivera (33) rises up for a transition dunk in the second half against Lewiston-Porter. (Spencer Bates)
Luckily for Olean, it was able to rely on its stars late in the game to get the result over the line. Mykel Rivera, who Kolasinski noted was frustrated with how Lew-Port took him out of the game in the first half, made a statement in the final two quarters of the affair in which he scored 18 of his team-high 23 points, hitting four clutch free throws to put the game just out of reach of the Lancers.
“Mykel is our leading scorer, he’s a very talented player and I think he was a little frustrated at half, either with not getting the buckets to fall, or feeling like maybe he was getting taken out of the game a little bit,” Kolasinski said. “The good thing with him and his maturation process is that he’s able to get himself going without forcing things. I thought he did a really good job of that tonight. He let the game come to him at times and when there were driving lanes, he took them. And obviously he came up huge at the end with his free throws. That was huge for us.”
And while Rivera may have struggled scoring the ball through the first 16 minutes of game time, the attention he drew allowed him to dish out passes to players like Dominic Giovine and Sullivan Hoffman.
“Mykel is a team player,” Kolasinski said. “He knows that he’s a very good basketball player, but he also understands that being a good basketball player isn’t just about him getting his shots or his points, and he’s able to use that against other teams sometimes when they double or triple-team him. And if you watch him play, he does. His eyes are up and he’s looking for his open teammates.”
Olean’s Dominic Giovine (22) attempts to get a put-back layup attempt up while fighting through contact from a Lewiston-Porter defender. Giovine finished with 17 points for the Huskies. (Spencer Bates)
Giovine, one of the beneficiaries of the attention Rivera received, was a force to be reckoned with on the offensive glass and was the main source of frustration for the Lancers in the first half. His physical stature (6-foot, 5 inches) and, as Kolasinski highlighted, his tenacity to reel in rebounds and loose balls has been key in his development from a bench player to one of the first names on opposition scouting reports.
“Obviously (Dominic’s) been great for us this season, but (for) a game like tonight, we saw two things on film, we thought that they did a really good job … crashing the offensive glass and we felt like we could maybe do a little bit of damage on our offensive glass,” Kolasinski said. “And obviously, when you have a player like Dominic, he comes up big on both ends. He just has a motor … we were just talking about how there’s times where he’s on the opposite side of the floor and he comes across the rim and ends up with the ball.”
Giovine ended up with the second-highest point tally for the Huskies on the night with 17 and was the only other player besides Rivera to finish in double figures. But still, Olean managed to get six different players on the scoresheet, meanwhile Lew-Port had less variety with just three players contributing to its tally. Greydan Barnwell led the Lancers with a game-high 32 points, hitting eight 3-pointers in the process.
With the win, Olean is set to face No. 10 seed Lackawanna in the A2 Semifinal on March 5 at the Buffalo State Sports Arena with tip-off slated for 8 p.m.
AT OLEAN
Lewiston-Porter (56)
Barnwell 12 0-0 32, Wylke 6 2-2 18, Raimondi 2 0-0 6. Totals: 20 2-2 56
Olean (59)
Rivera 8 5-5 23, Giovine 8 1-2 17, Hoffman 4 0-3 8, Mest 2 0-2 6, Bohdanowycz 1 1-2 3, Tingley 0 2-2 2. Totals: 23 9-16 59
L-P 11 23 35 56
OL 14 25 45 59Three-point goals: L-P 14 (Barnwell 8, Wylke 4, Raimondi 2), OL 4 (Rivera 2, Mest 2); Total fouls: L-P 14, OL 13; fouled out: None.
