photo by: Kim North

St. Clairsville’s Ollie Muhly (11) guards Bellaire’s Alex Padgett during Saturday night’s Ohio Division V, East 2 sectional tournament co-final on John Jenkins Court. The Red Devils prevailed, 96-53.

ST. CLAIRSVILLE — A coach wants his team to be playing its best when tournament time rolls around. Although it lost by a wide margin to close the regular season, St. Clairsville’s schedule has prepared it for the postseason.

The top-seeded Red Devils (16-7) led wire-to-wire Saturday night in their Ohio Division V, East 2 sectional co-final en route to a lop-sided 96-53 verdict over No. 15 Bellaire (5-18) on John Jenkins Court.

“That’s why we play in those types of games against teams like Steubenville,” veteran St. Clairsville head coach Ryan Clifford advised. “We play a top 20 schedule in Ohio for those reasons, to get ready for this week ahead. We showed we’ll be ready for the week coming up.”

Clifford and the Red Devils will take to the court again on Wednesday against No. 7 Tuscarawas Valley in the district semifinals at a site to be determined by Eastern District officials. The Trojans took out No. 13 Buckeye Local, 63-41, on Saturday night.

St. Clairsville scored the first five points of the contest and never looked back. It scored 20-plus points in all four quarters in reaching a season-high point total.

Silky smooth sophomore Luke Schafer topped St. Clairsville’s well-balanced scoring attack with 18 points. Seniors Griffin Straub, Ollie Muhly and Kaden Clifford each added 12, while classmate Niko Jacob finished with 10. Seven other Red Devils reached the scoring column as Tyler Kosek had eight off the bench. Brody Clifford and Lucas Causey had seven apiece.

“Any time you get a chance to do something like this is great,” Clifford said while watching his team cut down the nets. “These seniors have put in a million hours, done everything we’ve asked them to do. This why you do it (coach) for night’s like tonight.”

The Big Reds entered the game on a four-game winning streak. They started the season with a win, but then dropped 17 straight before catching fire late.

“I just told the kids that I’ve been on a basketball team for 42 years. I’ve been playing or coaching since I was 10, I’ve never lost two starters and I’ve never lost 17 games in a row,” Battista said. “But, because they are such good kids, they showed a lot of heart and effort that we were able to gut out four wins in a row. That was great for them and they deserved those wins. They kept coming to practice and trying hard. I’ve had some good teams that came to practice and then quit. These guys didn’t do that and I applaud them for that.”

Battista was referring to injured juniors Raekwon Pettigrew and Kole Gonglik as the two starters the Big Reds were playing without.

Jace Violet led Bellaire with 16 points. Trevor Dowery added 11 and Michael Dippel nine.

The taller Red Devils enjoyed a commanding, 37-21, advantage off the glass as Straub, an NCAA D-II signee at Indiana, Pa., grabbed game honors with eight. Jacob finished with six and four steals. Dowry had seven to lead the Big Reds.

St. Clairsville shot 37-of-71 from the floor and was perfect on its 10 free-throw attempts. Bellaire was 19-of-51 from the field.

“St. Clairsville is a very good, senior-dominated team,” veteran Bellaire head coach J.R. Battista said. “They have length and good size. Those seniors have probably been playing together since they were in the second grade and they’ve got an early-signing (NCAA) Division II signee who has a lot of pieces around him.”

Bellaire was chartered with 18 turnovers, 12 more than St. Clairsville.