Taconic Comes Back in Fourth to Edge Monument Mountain

PITTSFIELD, Mass. – For three months, the Taconic and Monument Mountain boys basketball teams were the most consistent winners in Berkshire County.

 

On Wednesday, they finally met head to head.

 

And the result did not disappoint.

 

Tayvon Sandifer and Maimoudou Bamba each scored 19 points, the Thunder stormed back from a 10-point deficit midway through the fourth quarter to earn a 61-60 win in the semi-finals of the Western Massachusetts Class B tournament.

 

Taconic used a 16-3 run to take a 61-58 lead in the final minute, and it made a defensive stop in the closing seconds to deny the Spartans and earn a berth in Saturday’s regional final against Springfield International Charter, a 66-59 loser when the teams met in Springfield on Feb. 13.

 

“Defense,” Sandifer said of the key to Taconic’s epic fourth-quarter run. “We knew we had to commit to defense. That’s where we create our offense. Everyone contributed. We did our job.

 

“We knew we needed [that last stop]. We couldn’t foul. They’ve got some hot shooters, some young prodigies down there.”

 

Taconic coach Bill Heaphy was happy to see his interior defense hold one of the county’s most dangerous scorers to 13 points.

 

“Any time you can hold [Khalil Carlson] to 13, you’ve got to be doing something right,” Heaphy said. “I thought [Bamba] did a terrific job on him. With help, we were trying to keep track of where he was and get some help guys around him.

 

“I thought Jayden [McCartney] came in and gave some minutes. [Carlson] is a tough player. That was big for us.”

 

Carlson did end up leading a balanced Monument Mountain scoring attack. Kyle Wellenkamp scored 11, and Adam Kronenberg had 10 as six different Spartans finished with at least eight points.

 

The two rivals from the old Berkshire County League kept the fans on the edge of their seats most of the night.

 

Neither team led by more than five points until the fourth quarter, which started with a 13-4 Monument Mountain run to open up a 55-45 lead.

 

Carlson got things started with an and-one in the post. Then he set up Manny Brown for a 3-pointer in the right-wing corner to make it 48-43.

 

After Taconic’s Steve Patch (eight points) hit a pair of free throws to get the margin to three, the Spartans scored the next seven: a Sebastian Guete-Ramirez triple and four straight foul shots from Griffin McElroy and Brown to make it a 10-point lead with 4 minutes, 6 seconds on the clock.

 

The Thunder then took over.

 

Bamba scored with an assist from Sandifer. A steal out of the Taconic’s press led to a Sandifer 3-pointer, and Ceasar Santos scored in transition to make it a one-possession game in the blink of an eye.

 

Out of a timeout, the Spartans were able to break the Taconic press and get to the line, but Monument Mountain missed both free throws, and Taconic came back with a Bamba putback at the other end to cut the deficit to 55-54.

 

Carlson scored in the post the next time down for Monument Mountain, but Taconic got a 3-pointer from Jamal Sistrunk to tie the game at 57-57.

 

Another Monument Mountain turnover led to Sandifer’s bucket in transition to give Taconic its first lead since 36-32.

 

Wellenkamp answered for the Spartans to tie it. But Sandifer scored on a baseline inbounds play with 39 seconds left to make it 61-59, Taconic.

 

McElroy hit the front end of a one-and-one with 26 seconds left and grabbed the rebound on a missed Taconic free throw a couple seconds later to give Monument Mountain the ball with the shot clock off.

 

The Spartans called timeout with 14.9 on the clock and got a look at the basket from Brown that rimmed out. Brown grabbed his own rebound, but his desperation heave at the buzzer was no good.

 

“I’ll trust Manny [Brown] with a look on that any day of the week,” Monument Mountain coach Randy Koldys said. “We just were trying to get it inside a little more. We tried to run something for Khalil [Carlson] inside, and we just couldn’t get it to him because Taconic played really good defense.

 

“I really believe my guys played their hearts out and gave me everything they had out there on the floor.”

 

Koldys and Taconic mentor Heaphy agreed that the all-Berkshire battle was just what their teams needed to wrap up the “official” MIAA regular season (Saturday’s Western Mass finals do not count toward state tournament seedings, which will be released during the day on Saturday).

 

“That’s a great team,” Heapy said of the Spartans. “They played terrific. We knew it was going to be a battle. And it was the kind of game we needed to be in. … That’s what we said at half-time: We need to be in this kind of game where every possession, everything you do matters. So we were lucky to come out on the winning end.”

 

The Spartans were not as lucky but still took away valuable experience.

 

“A couple of the games we had this year where we won by a lot of points, that doesn’t do us any good because we don’t feel that pressure,” Koldys said. “We had a tough game toward the end of the regular season with South Hadley, and these two games [Wahconah in the quarter-finals and Wednesday night] will set us up nice for the states.”