ANDOVER — From the opening tip-off, the game was never in doubt.
Andover’s ability to get up and down the court, scoring endless baskets in transition and totally exhausting the Belmont players was a masterpiece.
But after giving up a handful of uncontested three-pointers, allowing the Marauders to hang around, the Golden Warriors, tightened things up defensively, allowing just one field goal in the third quarter, which was the final dagger.
Led by the performances of Josh Roux, Charlie Tutwiler, Roman Gimmarco and Logan Sullivan, No. 2 seed Andover came away with a convincing 64-52 win over No. 31 Belmont in a Division 1 Round of 32 contest played before a jammed-packed home crowd.
“Nothing has changed around here. Play defense, rebound and run. That’s what we’re trying to do, just run,” said Andover head coach Dave Fazio.
“Our defensive philosophy is do everything you can to make the other team uncomfortable,” he noted. “That’s Bill Belichick, right? Their number 22 (Braiden Dargon) is real good player, so we tried to double him and try to get the ball out of his hands. I don’t know, just so proud of these kids. They are so tough.”
Roux was on absolute fire to open the game. He scored 14 of his game-high 28 points over the game’s first 4:46.
“It’s a great environment, a great crowd and I felt good. We wanted to get this game off to a good start,” said Roux.
The buckets slowed down a bit for Roux over the next three quarters, but that allowed Gimmarco (10 points, 11 rebounds), Sullivan (15 points) and Tutwiler (11 points, 5 defensive steals) to get their share.
Gimmarco was immense on the glass all night. In the fourth quarter after Belmont cut the deficit to nine with 4:33 to go, he drained a clutch three-pointer to end the Marauders’ comeback bid.
“He’s incredible,” said Roux. “He’s only a sophomore and just 15 years old, but he continues to come to practice and just works, works and works. The past however weeks he has hit a big shot in every game.”
Giammarco and senior Benjamin Hnat (8 rebounds) combined for 21 rebounds, which led to the run-and-shoot offense.
“The two of them are awesome,” said Roux. “Ben’s the best rebounder in the state. It’s not even close. He gets every single one, offensively and defensively. When you’ve got kids who can do that, it makes our lives easier.”
Even though Andover had four players in double-figures, Fazio admitted that all four should’ve had a lot more.
“We just have too concentrate and finish more. We missed so many bunnies. If we concentrate and make the bunnies, it’s a 20-plus point game,” he said. “I don’t know what it is. We are working so hard (in the defensive end), we’re rush here (in the offensive end). We just need to slow down just a bit.”
Girls roll over Taunton
A few weeks ago, the Andover High girls saw their offense take several steps backwards in an ugly win over Lowell. Head coach Alan Hibino said that the team realized that they needed to “clean-up” in some areas.
After a slow start in the first few minutes, No. 4 Andover polished off its offensive skills and throttled No. 29 Taunton 55-31.
“We definitely spent the time at practice knowing what defense was coming and we tried to prepare ourselves for that,” said senior Kiera Lenihan. “We did a really good job of beating their defense tonight.”
Andover (20-1) got off to a slow start, trailing 5-2 midway through the first, before ending it on an 8-0 run. Midway through the second, the Golden Warriors led 28-11.
With less than two minutes left in the third, Taunton (8-13) closed the deficit to nine, but Andover responded with a 16-0 run to put the game away.
“It was our first game in eleven days so it took a while (to get going) and it went in waves,” said Hibino. “We dropped off a little bit in the third quarter but I think that was just finding our legs. We took this one down, so it’s one at a time.”
Lenihan is the only player on the roster who was part of the 2023 state championship team. Although she didn’t play during that magical run, she has believes this year’s team has many of those same winning traits.
“That group of girls (from the 2023 team) really believed in each other,” she said. “They all trusted each other. I knew that I had to carry that down to this team and I think that has definitely shown.”