Wellsville the favorite, followed by North Rose Wolcott
Attica lost to league foe Notre Dame twice this season, including at home in December.
| BataviasBest.org
Monday, February 23, 2015
Beginning this Friday night, #7 Le Roy (7-12) and #5 Attica (13-6) will begin their trek towards the Class B2 Title. In their way during the first round will be #4 Dansville (12-7) for the Devils and #2 North Rose-Wolcott (14-4) for the Knights, as each team looks for a spot in the semi finals the following week.
If Attica is to overcome Dansville during their first round affair, they will then be faced with the daunting task of defeating the #1 Wellsville Tigers (16-3) – who I expect to handle the winner of #8 Midlakes (2-16) and #9 Way-Co (2-16) during their quarterfinal matchup on Saturday.
For the Knights, if they are to somehow pull the upset over NRW, they will advance to face the winner of #3 Marcus Whitman (13-5) and #6 Bath-Havering (6-12) in the semis (I expect it to be MW). However, North Rose-Wolcott is a team of high-quality and it will take Le Roy’s best effort in order for them to complete the upset and advance past the first round.
All that aside, I expect Wellsville to be the winner of this bracket when it is all said and done.
Although I do not have detailed statistics for the Tigers, all accounts, including a close game against highly-talented Leadership Academy, force me to believe that this is a very good basketball team that possesses several capable players on each side of the court. In addition to their overall talent as a team, their head coach Jim Insley is expected to step down as head coach at the conclusion of the season – giving his players extra-incentive to end the year with a Section V Title.
Despite this belief, however, if Attica can get hot and defeat Dansville, and then carry their momentum into a matchup with Wellsville, I do see the Devils having a shot at pulling the upset and advancing to the Finals – where I would expect NRW or Marcus Whitman would be waiting for them.
I watched North Rose – who defeated Attica during the Sectional Tournament last season – play earlier this year and the one thing that stood out to me was their size, but I would expect Attica to matchup well with them. MW has one 6’5″ forward, but other than that are fairly undersized, and I would expect Attica to be able to compete with them as well on all fronts.
In the end it really all comes down to Wellsville, in my opinion, as they will likely set the pace in this bracket.
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Stay tuned throughout the entire Sectional Tournament for increased coverage of each local team’s journey towards a Championship.
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Section V Boys Basketball Tournament – Class A2 Sectional Preview – Batavia earns top-seed
Batavia and Notre Dame Hockey bow out in first round of Sectionals
Two local track teams walk away from Section V Championships with respective Class Titles
