Panthers advance to Far West Regional finals
BY BOB BENZ THE LEADER

ERIC WENSEL/THE LEADER Campbell-Savona's Andy Knowles drives to the basket past Gananda's Trevor Stearns.

WATERLOO - Sean Mourhess is such an accomplished track and field star that he'll likely pursue the sport at the Division I college level next year.

And although he was sporting black high-tops, Mourhess might as well have been wearing his track shoes during the first half of Thursday's Section V, Class C regional qualifier at Waterloo High School.

Mourhess netted 24 of his game-high 26 points in the first half as Campbell- Savona ran Gananda out of the gym in the opening 16 minutes and coasted to a 61-45 victory.

"He used his quickness and he was in a zon e - he's been in that zone all week long," Campbell-Savona head coach Merlin Button said of Mourhess. "Last night in practice, Sean was lighting it up just like that and I was just hoping it was gonna carry over and it certainly did. He is very athletic and it takes a great defender to stay with him."

The Class CCC champion Panthers moved on to play Section VI champ Maple Grove at 2 p.m. Saturday at Finger Lakes Community College in Canandaigua in the Class C Far West Regional finals. The winner will earn a trip to Glens Falls and the State Final Four.

Against the Class CC champion Gananda Panthers, C a m p b e l l - Savona took advantage of the fact that its opponent was playing for the second time in as many nights. Gananda earned a date with defending state champion Campbell-Savona after posting a 64-42 win over Class C champion Red Jacket.

And so Campbell-Savona (23-1) made it a point to turn the game into a track meet and wear Gananda (19-4) down by constantly sending players down court to fetch long outlet passes, which resulted in a number of easy breakaway layups for the Class CCC champs.

"It's tough to play two games back-to-back," Button said. "In light of that, we went after them really hard and we were ready to go and I just thought the kids did a great job. The whole idea was to push the ball as much as possible and make them work. We were ready to play - we held off a couple days and we were very antsy to get out here on the floor and get it done."

Mourhess- who excels in the long jump and triple jump during track season - did his best Lee Evans impersonation as he was the recipient of many of Campbell-Savona's long bomb outlet passes.

"We definitely wanted to push the ball up the court and run with them because

we knew their legs would be tired playing back-toback games," Mourhess said.

And when Mourhess wasn't out running Gananda defenders for easy buckets, he was spotting up from the corner, where he buried four 3- pointers - two from each side. In fact, each of Mourhess' four triples came in the first quarter as the Panthers bolted out to an 18-0 lead on 6-of-12 shooting.

"That was really important (to jump ahead early) because Gananda's been playing with the lead in all their games previous to this one and we wanted them to play from behind," Mourhess said.

Mourhess scored the Panthers' first eight points and was responsible for 12 of the team's first 18 points.

Defensively, Campbell- Savona made life miserable for Gananda shooters and limited the Class CC champs to just one field goal on 1-of-11 shooting in the opening quarter. By halftime, it didn't get much better as Gananda managed to shoot just 4-of-24 from the field in the first half and trailed 34-15 at in termission.

Gananda didn't get on the board until Mike Dermady hit a pair of free throws with 2:53 to play in

the first quarter.

Campbell-Savona increased its lead to 30-9 on 5-of-7 shooting to open the second quarter as its fastbreak transition game produced each of its first five field goals of the quarter.

Although Mourhess cooled off a bit in the second half, teammate Camden Wright helped pick up the slack by burying each of his three 3- pointers in the second half. Wright finished with nine points off the bench and Maynard Crane added 12 points, thanks in part to a perfect 6-for-6 effort at the line.

Senior Will Cornett managed just two points, but dished out six assists and came up with two steals. Zach Simpson added six points and a team-best seven rebounds, while Mourhess also came up with three steals.

Gananda opened the second half on a 7-0 run to pull within 12, but never got closer. J.R. Williams dropped in six from long distance and led Gananda with 22 points.