Indian Valley drops River View in Division II tourney

BELMONT – Despite some first-half struggles, No. 15 seed River View stayed with fifth-seeded Indian Valley on Tuesday night.

However, the Braves pulled away in the second half for a 59-33 victory over the Black Bears in a Division II sectional final at OU-Eastern.

River View (6-17) was just 12-of-50 from the floor, including 5-of-23 on 3s, and saw top scorer Matt Brillhart limited to six points on 2-of-14 shooting.

"They really did a good job taking Matt out of the game and forced everyone else to try to beat them," Black Bears coach Jason Trout said. "We were just unable to get into a rhythm offensively the whole game and that had a lot to do with their length on the defensive end."

Jon Dart did everything he could in the first half to keep the Black Bears in contention, hitting two 3-pointers that helped them tie the game at 11 after one quarter.

He added five more points in the second, but a 10-4 run in the final 4:40 of the period helped the Braves make it 26-19 at halftime.

A 13-6 scoring edge third quarter made it 39-25 Braves, which proved to be all the cushion they needed.

Dalton Bolon had 16 points as 10 different players scored in the win for Indian Valley. Dart finished with a game-high 17 points and five rebounds.

Trout felt the final score didn't do the game much justice considering how his team played in the first half.

"I thought it was a favorable match-up and they didn't really surprise with anything they did against us," he said. "But we just couldn't buy a shot for a couple of different stretches in the game and it's really disappointing that things got out of hand that fast."

Trout also commented at his guys possibly being fatigued from all the regular season games stacked up on top of each other late in the season.

"We tried to play some different kids throughout the year, but it just seemed like our main kids were worn out by the end of the season," he said. "Hopefully that's something we can improve upon next season."

River View loses just one senior in Marcus Watson, so Trout already has high expectations.

"We have a lot of guys returning who are great leaders and that's encouraging," he said. "I'm excited for summer because I think we have a chance to do something special next season if we are willing to put in the work during the summer."

jmickeyjr@gannett.com

Twitter: @TribuneJJMickey