By Jon Dinan
FALLSBURG — February 26, 2013 – Fallsburg qualified for sectionals for a fourth straight year with Thursday’s 62-43 non-league win over visiting Sullivan West.
Both teams came out of the gate shooting cold.
Fallsburg jumped out to a quick 5-2 to begin the game, but Matt Cardona knotted the score with a traditional three-point play.
Jarrett Madison responded with a three-point play conversion of his own to give the hosts an 8-6 lead.
With the Bulldogs down by one and the first quarter winding down, Sawyer Erlwein hit two big free throws after he was fouled underneath the basket, to give his team a one point lead at the end of the opening quarter of play.
That was the only lead of the game for SW.
This Bulldog surge came as Fallsburg’s Rakkir Watson was catching his breath on the bench for a few minutes.
As soon as Watson checked back into the game at the start of the second quarter, Fallsburg scored five unanswered points and took a 30-23 lead into halftime. Watson netted 14 of his team’s 20 points in the stanza.
In the second half, the host Comets pulled away with a 19-11 edge in the third.
“I thought we did well tonight as a whole,” said Watson, whose 35 led all scorers. “Our coach [Pete Dworetsky] told us after the game that he felt like he didn’t even have to coach us.”
“Nobody played good defense tonight. We got off to a good start, but we need to find a way to get stops in transition, and finish strong,” Matt Cardona said of the Bulldogs’ effort.
Helping Watson with nine points apiece were Madison and Nick Pinder.
Patrick Pierce led SW with 12 points. Cardon and Erlwein contributed nine apiece.
Fallsburg hosted Millbrook last night in the Class quarterfinals. Results were not available at press time.
Sullivan West travels to Ellenville on February 26 for a Class B quarterfinal.
Notes: It was Senior Night at Fallsburg CS and honored were Robert Fore, Abram Bryan, Ryan McKeon, Rakkir Watson, Jared Madison, and Aaron Burrell