By RICK SPRUNGER
Bellmont came. It saw. And it went home, quickly and quietly.
Norwell dismissed Bellmont with barely a wave of its hand Friday night in a key Northeast 8 Conference boys basketball game.
The final score was 69-54, and the game really wasn’t that close.
Or it wouldn’t have had to be.
“We lost focus coming out in the third quarter,” said Norwell coach Mike McBride after the game. “We were flat in the second half.”
But what a first half.
After spotting Bellmont a 13-11 lead early, Norwell went on a rampage.
The Knights ran off 12 unanswered points from the 2:16 mark of the first quarter to the 6:32 mark of the second to take command at 23-13.
Then, with the score 26-17, the Knights did it again, blasting off on a 16-7 spurt over the remainder of the first half for a 44-24 spread at the intermission.
Bellmont never got closer than the final 15-point margin after that.
“Our kids were ready to go,” said McBride. “We had good defensive pressure, we were good at attacking the basket, and we were good on the offensive boards. We thought (Bellmont) would have a difficult time keeping us from scoring.”
That proved prophetic, with Norwell running up 44 points in the first half.
And Norwell didn’t even show Bellmont all of its offensive weapons.
The Knights only hit six of 20 three-point shots for a subpar .300 from bonus land.
But they feasted on the smaller Braves inside.
“Our inside guys were assertive early in the game,” continued McBride. “We got good aggressiveness from Brody Bolyn, Luke Graft, and Ashton Federspiel. They combined for 24 points.”
Federspiel had 11 points off the bench, Bolyn seven, and Graft six.
And the Knights crushed Bellmont on the boards.
The margin ended up 36-25 for the game.
But in the first half, when the game was actually decided, it was 18-7.
Norwell was repeatedly getting second and third shots at the basket.
The one that really put a charge into the home club came with the score knotted at 13-13.
Cohen Bailey rebounded a Luke McBride miss and fed his brother, Lleyton Bailey, for a three-pointer from just to the left of the top of the key that gave the Knights the lead for good at 16-13.
McBride followed with a midcourt theft and a one-on-nothing bunny, Cohen Bailey grabbed a rebound and went coast to coast for another layup, and Norwell was off to the races.
McBride led Norwell with 16 points and 10 rebounds, but there was plenty of balance.
Lleyton Bailey joined McBride and Federspiel in double figures with 11 points, and eight Norwell players scored at least five.
The Knights were 18-for-30 from the field in that devastating first half for a .600 shooting percentage and finished their evening’s work at 25-for-51 for .490.
Bellmont was 22-for-52 for .431.
Jack Scheumann paced the Braves with 24 points, with 14 coming in the fourth quarter when the game was well out of hand.
Norwell also won the junior varsity contest, 40-24.
Adam McBride scored 12 points to lead Norwell while Caidan Petrie added seven, Kaedyn Quintanilla and Ryne Thornton six apiece, Brady Smith four, Garry Riley three, and Jase Harmon two.
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NORWELL 69, BELLMONT 54
at Norwell High School
BELLMONT (7-7, 0-3 NE8): Andrew James 4-8 0-0 9, Jack Scheumann 9-15 2-4 24, D.J. Kitson 1-4 2-4 4, Kord Fuelling 5-16 0-0 11, Dylan Velez 2-6 0-0 4, Gavin Krull 0-2, Job Hoffman 0-0 0-0 0, Trent Geimer 0-0 0-0 0, Jayden Haines 0-0 0-0 0. TOTAL: 22-52 4-8 54.
NORWELL (12-2, 3-0 NE8): Jake Parker 2-7 3-5 7, Cohen Bailey 3-5 0-0 6, Lleyton Bailey 4-9 0-0 11, Luke McBride 7-12 0-0 16, Brody Bolyn 3-7 1-2 7, Gavin Hoeppner 1-3 2-2 5, Luke Graft 1-2 4-6 6, Ashton Federspiel 4-6 3-4 11, Adam McBride 0-0 0-0 0, Brady Smith 0-0 0-0 0, Kaedyn Quintanilla 0-0 0-0 0. TOTAL: 25-51 13-19 69.
Bellmont 13 11 10 20 — 54
Norwell 20 24 10 5 — 69
Three-point shooting: Bellmont 6-15 (James 1-1, Scheumann 4-5, Fuelling 1-7, Krull 0-2), Norwell 6-20 (Parker 0-3, C. Bailey 0-2, L. Bailey 3-8, McBride 2-4, Hoeppner 1-3). Rebounds: Bellmont 25 (Kitson 7, Scheumann 5, Fuelling 5), Norwell 36 (McBride 10, C. Bailey 6). Turnovers: Bellmont 8, Norwell 10. Personal fouls: Bellmont 13, Norwell 12. Fouled out: None. Technical fouls: None.
Junior Varsity: Norwell 40, Bellmont 24.
