By Michael Letendre
PLAINVILLE – The Bristol Central boys basketball team doesn’t have many fond memories from the Ivan Wood Gymnasium in Plainville over the years.
The pesky Blue Devils have always given the Rams trouble on the court, mucking up the game and keeping things close.
But after a back-and-forth start between the teams in the most recent showdown on Monday, Central quickly took off with the game – never looking back.
A blazing 27-5 run over a stretch of nine minutes in the first half doomed Plainville as the Rams snared an 81-42 CCC South victory to move to 5-0 on the campaign.
The 81 points was a season high for the undefeated Rams.
Central made early miscues in the game, playing very unselfishly but creating turnovers in the process, allowing Plainville (1-5) early offensive chances.
But once the Rams turned defense into offense, an 8-8 contest turned into a 39-17 blowout by half.
“This place has been our death trap for three years,” said Central coach Tim Barrette of Plainville. “I literary said to my guys before the game, ‘can I not come in here and have to punch a locker [or] kick a locker to get us going because it’s a one-point game?’ Don’t get me wrong, we were up 22 points at the half but at the same time, defensively we allowed [Plainville] to get a couple of easy looks early on and they made them.”
“Give them credit but we were a little unselfish early where we portably just could have scored and if we scored, we could have probably been up even more at the half.”
Six Central players notched at least seven points in the game as the squad continued to show remarkable balance.
Damion Glasper scored a game-high 17 points and was in attack mode all evening long while center Donovan Clingan picked his spots – posting 16 points and a dozen rebounds while displaying his usual brand of hustle defense.
Carson Rivoira nabbed 13 points and several offensive rebounds, Mason Stokes canned two 3s on his way to eight points, and Steve Alseph and Aaron Brown each added seven to complement the scoring attack.
Plainville (1-5) battled and when Central gave senior Brennan Staubley space to shoot from outside, he netted eight of his team-high 15 points over the first five minutes of the game to keep things close at midway through things at 14-10.
That last first period hoop from Staubley chopped the deficit to four but it was a 23-10 game through nearly eight minutes of play as steals by Alseph helped the visiting team put together a 9-0 run.
“The ball pressure between [Alseph] and Victor Rosa has been phenomenal – leading to easy points for Damion, Carson, and Donovan,” said Barrette. “You can’t replace ball pressure. Those two really do a good job.”
Leading 23-13 going into the second period, Central suffocated Plainville as the home team scored just four points as the Rams went on the attack.
Blair and Clingan opened the second tilt with jumpers, Glasper then found Rivoira for an easy lay-up, Glasper hit two consecutive hoops and when Clingan put-back a miss, the Rams led 35-13 with 3:24 left to play in the half.
On the flip side, Central’s defense was too much to contend with as the Blue Devils were limited to six first half buckets, trailing 39-17 going into the halftime break.
Plainville’s Dylan Brewer (nine points) opened the third period with a three-point play, trimming the deficit to 19 but that hoop was the only highlight for the home team over the frame.
Central scored 16 straight points to ice the contest at 55-20 as Rosa found Glasper for a 3 to open the spurt, Clingan then hit a Kevin McHale-like hook shot and Rivoira – scoring five points and was simply everywhere on the court – added an offensive rebound and put-back to propel the Rams to that 35-point push with 3:12 remaining in the third.
“That’s my glue guy,” said Barrette of Rivoira. “He’s the guy that sparked that run. We went on a quick 12-0 run in about a minute-and-a-half that was based upon him defensively and him getting offensive rebounds and put-backs. He did an overall great job tonight.”
And once the starters left the game midway through the third, Central ended the period with a 10-4 burst as Powell scored four points on two offensive boards while Stokes buried two loud baseline 3s to give the squad a 67-27 cushion through three.
Over the final period, Central’s Jayeson VanBeveren canned a shot, Brown hit two hoops in a row and when Zach Vanasse dropped in a free throw with 1:12 left, the cushion reached 40 again at 81-39.
The Rams ended up winning by thirty-nine to move to a perfect 5-0 as the program is the top ranked team in the CIAC Division II standings.
“Obviously, we knew we were the better team coming into tonight,” said Barrette. “So I wrote on the board before the game, ‘this game is about us.’ We had to beat us. The only person that could beat us is us. We did a good enough job in the first half. I give the first half a B- or a C+ but I thought once we [tasted] the blood in the water, we really started pushing the ball.”
“I thought we did a great job all night pushing the basketball with Damion Glasper filling lane on the wing. He was an animal tonight.”
Bristol Central Boys Basketball – CCC South Action
BRISTOL CENTRAL 81, PLAINVILLE 42
from the Ivan Wood Gymnasium, Plainville
Bristol Central (5-0) 23 16 28 14 – 81
Plainville (1-5) 13 4 10 15 – 42
BRISTOL CENTRAL (81): Victor Rosa 1 0 2, Mike Allen 0 0 0, Damion Glasper 8 0 17, Tre Blair 2 0 4, Steven Alseph 2 3 7, Mason Stokes 3 0 8, Aaron Brown 3 0 7, Carson Rivoira 6 1 13, Donovan Clingan 8 0 16, Julius Powell 1 2 4, Jayeson VanBeveren 1 0 2, Jaysun Dominguez 0 0 0, Zach Vanasse 0 1 1, Jelani Walton 0 0 0, Henry Ross 0 0 0. Totals: 35 7 81.
PLAINVILLE (42): Roman Lee 0 0 0, George James 1 0 2, Brady Wieczorek 3 0 8, Kevin Rondini 1 0 3, Brennan Staubley 5 2 15, Dylan Brewer 3 1 8, M.J. Bakaysa 0 0 0, Cam Lamothe 2 0 4, Seve Urena 1 0 2. Totals: 16 3 42.
Three-point goals: Damion Glasper (BC), Mason Stokes (BC) 2, Aaron Brown (BC), Brady Wieczorek (P) 2, Kevin Rondini (P), Brennan Staubley (P) 3, Dylan Brewer (P).
Records: Bristol Central 5-0, Plainville 1-5.
