Thirteen and under. Thirteen and under. It's the phrase that Batavia Head Coach Buddy Brasky has pounded into the head of his players all season. Just hold the opponent to 13 or fewer points per quarter, and you're going to win basketball games.
Friday night at Blue Cross Arena in Rochester, it was more like 10 and under as the Blue Devils secured a Section V title with a 65-38 victory over #3 seed Livonia.
It was the first time in four Section V titles for Batavia under the leadership of Brasky that an opponent was held to fewer than 40 points.
More significantly, it is the first time in Batavia history that a varsity basketball team won back-to-back Section V titles.
"All the alumni, all of them that talk, but we’ve got that on them," said Junior Andrew Hoy. "They all had sectional titles, but we got two."
Hoy, who got to 1,000 career points, scored faster than any player in Batavia history, with 11 against Livonia and was named the tournament's MVP.
But for all of his offensive prowess, after the game, Hoy talked about defense.
"Defense got us the win," Hoy said. "Coach told us if we hold them to 13 and under per quarter we’d get the win, we would be sectional champs. We came out in the third quarter and won that quarter 25-2."
Their lopsided quarter allowed Batavia to run away with the game. After falling behind 13-0 against Batavia to start in the first quarter, Livonia was never really able to get into the game. The squad never pulled closer than 8 points.
"I showed them the past sectional championship pictures and I showed them score boards, because I always take a picture of the score board if we win and I hang it up in the trophy case, and all the scores were in the 40s for the other teams," Brasky said. "This the first year we got them under 40. We got them at 38, so they were pretty excited about that."
Coach Brasky gave credit to Josh Budlong for the quick start. Budlong finished the game with 21 points. Co Co Irvin scored 15 and Justin Washington added 8.
Bobby Schuster was the leading scorer for Livonia with 18 points. He was the only Livonia player to reach double digits.
The Sportsmanship Award went to Lou Stoller.
Batavia players who made the All-Tournament Team were Washington, Irvin, Budlong and Hoy.
Next, on Wednesday Batavia plays the qualifying game for the state championship series.
UPDATE: More pictures after the jump (nearly 70 more)
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