Boys Basketball: South Carroll Moves Into Final Four (With Video)

Before a standing room only crowd, South Carroll put an impressive beating on county rival Winters Mill, 59-34 to advance to the Class 2A final four.

The attendance was put at 2,000 by South Carroll’s Jim Carnes. He said they had to turn away about 500 more.

"You can’t say how much it helped to be at home. That was just tremendous," said Cavalier coach Doug Goff.

Most of the crowd stayed to watch the South Carroll players cut down the net.

South Carroll will play a semi-final contest on Friday night at 9 p.m. at Comcast Center at the University of Maryland.

It is the third region crown in three years under coach Doug Goff.

The two teams split their regular season games. The loss was South Carroll’s only blemish on their 24-1 season. The Falcons ended the season at 20-5.

"I can’t say I expected it. I knew we would play better, but we were on all cylinder today and it was nice," said Goff.

Both teams came out intense, but the Cavaliers were hot from beyond the arc and sunk five three-pointers in the opening eight minutes to lead 23-10. The Falcons hit the first points of the game, but were never close after that.

"Three pointers changed the game. I mean, if one team hits them and the other team doesn’t it can over ride good, bad plays everywhere else. We had a little bit of both, good defense and hit the three’s," said Goff.

The McTavish brothers, Ryan and Gavin both on jams on the night, which got the South Carroll fans excited.

There was a play in the third period which said the night belonged to South Carroll. Jeff Martin dribbled down the court and dribbled the ball off his knee. The ball went straight to Ryan McTavish, who hit a lay-up for two points.

"I wish them really well. They are long, they are athletic. Coach Goff has them unbelievable sound defensively. They have the 'x-factor' in Ryan, a special player. I don’t know what the other regions and teams have, but you are going to see a lot of talent down there. In my opinion they have the ability to accomplish anything because of how sound they are defensively. They play really clear, they just play. I wish them the best,’’ said Falcon coach Dave Herman.

Ryan McTavish led the victors with 21 points. He now has 1,480 for his career and moves within seven of tying Westminster’s Herman Costley’s county record of 1,487.

Backing up McTavish was Dan Mullen with 16, while Gavin McTavish had seven, Eric Hunsberger, six; Ryan Tate, five; Jeff Martin and Shane Martin had two points each.

Brian Martin had a big game the last time the two teams met. This time the Cavalier defense took him out of the game.

"We were hoping it was a home game for them and he wouldn’t come over here and do that against us today. We tried to prepare to take him away a little bit early and not let him get started. He hit a couple of early three’s over there against us and then he remained hot the whole game and had a lot of confidence. We took him away early and he didn’t look for his shot as much," said Goff.

Jenkins led Winters Mill with 14 points, Horn chipped in 11, Craig Bowen had five, while Brian Martin and TJ Sands had two points each.

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