FITCHBURG — The Mahar boys summer basketball team needed to defeat North Middlesex on Tuesday, the final game of the regular season, to even sniff a playoff spot. Instead, the team gave up a nine-point lead in the final seven minutes to lose 42-38.
“They played young,” said Mahar summer coach Enver Softic. “Instead of making team decisions, it broke down into, each guy thought they had to make the play to help us and you can’t play basketball that way. I didn’t have any timeouts left, so I wasn’t really able to do anything to help them, but I don’t think it mattered if I had 10 timeouts. It was that immaturity that came back to bite us and it bit us all summer.”
Mahar finished its summer season needing to defeat North Middlesex and needing Oakmont to lose to force a one-game wild card for the fourth and final playoff spot. Oakmont had not played by the time Mahar’s game finished.
North Middlesex finished Tuesday’s game on a 13-0 in the final seven minutes. After Mahar’s Zach Notre and Deven Patch both missed the initial free throw on a one-and-one attempt, North Middlesex hit a three with one minute and 50 seconds left to go up 39-38.
With exactly one minute left in the game, Charlie Barnes pulled up and shot from beyond the arc but was blocked. Down 41-38, Matt Lyesiuk pulled in the defensive rebound with 25 seconds left and was fouled, only to miss the initial free throw on another one-and-one attempt. Jordan Desrosiers missed the tying 3-pointer with 15 seconds left.
When asked about the shot selection at the end of the game, Softic attributed shot selection to the team’s point guard position and not having a pure “ball distributor.”
“It goes back to, if you have a true point guard, who’s not looking to score, just looking to create, he finds the open man,” said Softic. “He makes the right pass in the moment, opposed to having guys that are good players but not with that point guard IQ. We didn’t have the person coming down the stretch who could find the right guy and everyone was trying to win the game by themselves.”
North Middlesex’s run came after Mahar pulled ahead 38-29 thanks to a 3-pointer from Lyesiuk (11 points) with seven minutes left in the game. Mahar had momentum and confidence on their side, as Lyesiuk’s 3 followed a span of four North Middlesex fouls within a one-minute span. North Middlesex were called for two grabs — once intentional — and two pushes that ultimately gave Mahar the momentum to turn a four-point game into a nine-point game.
“We didn’t make enough routine plays coming down the stretch,” said Softic. “I mean, we didn’t even have to make great plays, we just had to make routine plays. A basket here, a foul, make one out of two (free throws), and instead we make long-distance passes and try to do something that’s going to be difficult to do and we turned the ball over or we took a bad shot.”
Tied going into halftime, Mahar pulled ahead on a three from Lyesiuk to begin the second half. Mahar led up until North Middlesex’s 13-0 run, when they took a 39-38 lead.
Mahar shot 14-for-38 (.368) as a whole. Lyesiuk led the team with 11 points, while Patch and Barnes each contributed eight points. Patch led the team with six rebounds and had four blocks. Jakob Carron added five rebounds.