Cavemen withstand T-Birds' rally

In a Region 6 boys basketball contest Tuesday, visiting American Fork dominated play through the first three quarters and withstood a fourth-quarter comeback attempt by Timpview to hold on for a 72-67 victory.

Early in the fourth, the Cavemen found themselves ahead 61-44. In less than six minutes of play, however, the T-Birds shaved the margin down to four points.

Despite making only 5 of 12 from the line in the game's final minute and a half, American Fork won when Timpview suddenly went cold from the field.

"It's a good win," said Cavemen coach Doug Meacham. "Down the stretch in this game, we weren't as aggressive as we should've been. We needed to be strong with the ball and still attack when we're up right there. We need to be able to hit free throws too."

Timpview opened the game in a zone defense, but American Fork loosened the zone by making outside shots and then punished the T-Birds when point guard Brenan Davis' precision passing found cutting Cavemen open for numerous uncontested layups.

Said Davis: "In the first half, what our coach wanted us to do was just move the ball, a lot of pass fakes, and get it into the middle and try and gap dribble and it opened up for us."

American Fork senior James Shoff, whose sticky defense held Timpview's Matt Mortensen to nine points, stretched the Cavemen's lead to 26-18 early in the second quarter when he nailed a 3-pointer and then went coast-to-coast for a layup after stealing the ball.

American Fork built the majority of its lead with T-Birds guard Griffin Miller sitting out the final five minutes of the first half with three personal fouls.

By halftime, the Cavemen had built a 42-29 lead. American Fork's Rick Shoff, whose 22 points on the night led all scorers, tallied nine of his 14 first-half points from the charity stripe.

When the T-Birds scrapped their zone defense at intermission, Davis took matters into his own hands and poured in 11 points in the third quarter, including six in a row at one point.

Timpview's mid-game adjustments finally kicked in early in the fourth quarter, and the Cavemen struggled to hold onto their lead.

"Every time when you have a lead going into the second half, it's hard to keep the momentum going for you when they're trying to overadjust," said Davis, who finished with 17 points to go with his many assists. "I thought we handled it well, just came out and held onto the ball and played (our game)."

Miller and Steve Nash each scored 17 for the T-Birds. James Shoff's 10 points and Clayton Searle's 13 meant that all four American Fork co-captains ended up scoring in double figures.