SALEM – It was going to be a tall mountain to climb for the Mapleton boys basketball team at Monday’s Division III district semifinal at Salem High School.
The 17th-seeded Mounties discoveredthat quickly against fourth-seeded Youngstown Cardinal Mooney, trailing 29-11 after the first quarter during an eventual 82-32 defeat.
The Cardinals (20-5) exploded out of the gate, hitting 7-of-12 treys for the game in the first eight minutes. They then held Mapleton (16-8) to just three points in the second quarter to end any doubt.
Mooney senior guard Jibri Carter led all scorers with 16 points, but it was the Cardinals’ offensive balance that impressed the most. The squad, which has won 18 of its last 20 games, had eight players with at least six points en route to its highest point total of the season.
Mapleton hadn’t allowed more than 56 points in its previous 11 games, but coach Nick Hickey said his team suffered 17 turnovers and simply couldn’t stop Mooney’s aggressive dribble-drive offense.
“They do a good job of not really trying to force it to anybody with set plays,” Hickey said. “They just kind of make you defend the drive, then as soon as you leave a shooter, he’s gonna hit it.”
The Cardinals will face the winner of Tuesday’s district semifinal between Perry and South Range. Mooney is ranked No. 8 in Division III on MaxPreps and received votes in the final AP state poll.
The Mounties finished with as many 3-point buckets as 2-pointers (six each). Junior guard Scotty Hickey netted 13 points to lead Mapleton, while senior guard Kyle Sloter dropped in nine.
Lane Dreibelbis (six points), Cole Vermilya (two) and Donavon Mills (two) rounded out the team’s scorers.
The game was the last for seniors Sloter, Dreibelbis, Vermilya, Jordan Davidson and Hunter Rogers.
“This group of seniors are going to be really hard to replace,” coach Hickey said. “They wanted to change the culture here at Mapleton and they definitely did that.
“Now they have a young group that’s following that saw what they did and they’re thinking, ‘We can do that, too. Maybe we can go a step further.’
“We had a lot of young kids that made the trip here and got to watch this and see the environment and were asking when open gyms start. That’s a really good sign for us.”
Monday’s loss completed one of the best seasons in Mapleton hoops history. The Mounties’ 16 wins represent their most in a season since 1981-82, and their sectional title last Friday over Youngstown Valley Christian was their first in 17 years.
Additionally, Mapleton’s 9-5 mark in Firelands Conference play was their most wins in league action since 1992-93.
Sloter finished his career with 1,023 points, second only to Gage Barone (1,354) in program history. He owns the MHS record for career steals.
Hickey will head into his senior year with 975 career points. His 57 3-pointers this winter were a single-season school record.
The basketball landscape in Ohio will change next year as well, with the state moving to seven divisions.
This marked just the second time in the last two decades that the Mounties played basketball as a Division III school. Since 2004, the only other year Mapleton was not Division IV was 2019-20.
Hickey said the Mounties were barely over the limit for Division IV, and with the seven-division format next year, the coach said Mapleton is projected to be in Division VI.
