Boys basketball: Keystone can't keep up with red-hot Tallmadge

TALLMADGE — Aaron Gergely seemingly couldn't miss Friday evening. The Tallmadge senior connected on 63 percent of his field goals, including eight 3-pointers, as Keystone couldn't overcome the hot-shooting Blue Devils during a 70-55 loss in their Division II Canton sectional final. No. 24-seeded Keystone ended its season at 13-11, while No. 7 Tallmadge (16-5) advanced to face No. 4 Glenville in the district semifinals at Canton McKinley on Thursday at 7 p.m. "We didn't follow through with the game plan throughout the game and we let them get some easy buckets," said senior Christian Pataky, who led the Wildcats with 21 points and nine rebounds. "(Gergely) was shooting good, but we were not up on him and we didn't trail him. He got those wide-open shots and he's a good enough shooter to where he will knock down those shots when he gets that open." While Gergely did the most damage, Tallmadge collectively shot the lights out from 3-point range, connecting on 13 of 30 attempts with five players sinking at least one. The Blue Devils started off shooting 5-of-6 in the first quarter, with Gergely hitting all three attempts and Caiden McCullough connecting on both of his. While McCullough slowed down — missing his other two attempts — Gergely was just getting warmed up. He added a fourth 3-pointer in the second before missing back-to-back attempts. He rectified those with back-to-back makes on the Blue Devils' first two possessions of the second half, stretching their lead to 32-21. "Every shot out of my hand felt like it was going in," said Gergely, who finished 8-of-13 from 3-point range for 29 points, adding six rebounds and a steal. "It's a big game and all we talked about was everybody stepping up. We all did, and it just happened to go my way. We're a good shooting team. Everybody can do what I just did tonight." Despite Tallmadge's hot shooting, Keystone had a few chances in the second and third quarters to regain control. After going down 21-9 in the second, the Wildcats scored seven unanswered and ended the quarter on a 12-3 run to get back within one possession for the first time since holding a 7-6 lead in the first quarter. But Tallmadge ended with a layup, and Gergely's back-to-back threes out of halftime gave the Blue Devils eight unanswered. The Wildcats whittled the gap to 39-35 with an 8-0 run, only for Gergely to spark Tallmadge with a jumper, then close the quarter with two threes — including one as time expired. "We knew they could shoot," Keystone coach Jeff Holzhauer said. "All the games we watched, when they were open they make it. The problem was they were open all night. My biggest fear coming in was stopping them off the dribble, and I thought we were able to do that early, but our guys are really used to helping. The game plan today was to not help, and we helped too much and left some guys open. "It's a challenge to adjust to certain competition, and we didn't do a good enough job stepping up and meeting that challenge." Contact Chris Sweeney at 329-7135 or ctsports@chroniclet.com. Follow him @CSweeney1686 on Twitter. Tallmadge 70, Keystone 55 KEYSTONE (55): Jake Morgan 3-1-9, Alex Nagle 0-0-0, Christian Pataky 7-4-21, Konner Rodick 2-1-5, Grant Hartley 2-1-6, A.J. Stroud 1-0-2, Ian Morgan 1-1-3, Zach Shackleford 0-0-0, Brock Miller 1-0-3, Ben Bostick 2-0-4, Luke Forthofer 1-0-2. Totals 20-8-55.TALLMADGE (70): Aaron Gergely 10-1-29, Ty Hurst 4-2-11, Caiden McCullough 2-0-6, Collin Dixon 5-0-10, Kaden Davis 3-0-7, Desmond Copeland 3-0-7, Niko Roldan 0-0-0. Totals 27-3-70. Keystone&emsp;&emsp; 9&emsp;&emsp;12&emsp;&emsp;20&emsp;&emsp;14&emsp;&emsp;—&emsp;&emsp;55Tallmadge&emsp;&emsp;17&emsp;&emsp; 9&emsp;&emsp;25&emsp;&emsp;19&emsp;&emsp;—&emsp;&emsp;70 Three-point goals: Keystone 7-26 (Pataky 3, Jake Morgan 2, Hartley, Miller), Tallmadge 13-30 (Gergely 8, McCullough 2, Copeland, Davis, Hurst). Field goals: Keystone 20-50 (40 percent), Tallmadge 27-56 (48 percent). Free throws: Keystone 8-13 (62 percent), Tallmadge 3-4 (75 percent). Rebounds: Keystone 31 (Pataky 9, Hartley 6, Rodick 6), Tallmadge 28 (Dixon 7, Gergely 6). Total fouls: Keystone 7, Tallmadge 12. Turnovers: Keystone 8, Tallmadge 6.