Last year the Morris boys repeated as Tri-Valley League champions by cruising through an undefeated regular season. With eight seniors departing, completing the three-peat figured to be quite the challenge for coach Gerry Joy in 2024.
But this new-look group of Mustangs proved equal to the task, clinching their third consecutive TVL crown with an 86-71 win over Milford Saturday at Unadilla Valley.
Tiger Ross made history of his own in the victory, scoring his 1,000th varsity point as part of a 29-point performance. Carter Sawyer, one of the new faces on varsity this year, came up huge in the title game, hitting seven three-pointers and finishing with 25 points.
Joy said it’s a credit to the work of the junior varsity team that this year’s varsity squad was able to reach the mountaintop yet again.
“These guys came up after I lost eight seniors last year and I had three guys that came up tonight ready to go,” he said. “Between Carter Sawyer, Jonah Baldo and Ryan Murphy, they were all JV players last year and we don’t win this game without them being ready to play throughout the season.”
Murphy and Asa Dugan each finished with 11 points in the win for Morris.
For Milford, Christian Lawson and Braden Murphy each had big nights, with Lawson scoring 26 points and Murphy scoring 24 thanks to seven three-pointers. Carter Stevens added 14 points.
With two of the best offenses around going head-to-head, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that the points came early and often.
Sawyer was the early spark plug for the Mustangs as he scored nine of Morris’ first 10 points to open up an early 10-5 lead.
Milford bounced back quickly and cut the deficit to 16-14 exiting the first quarter on a three-pointer by Lawson.
The second quarter saw a succession of runs by both sides until Morris started to open things up. Dugan hits a three with two minutes to go to make it 36-26 and Sawyer would make another trey right before the half to put Morris up 39-26. Sawyer would finish the first half with 19 points.
The two sides combined for 22 three-pointers in the game, which for his part Joy said was a result of taking what the defense gave his team.
“It’s what we’ve done most of the year,” he said about relying on the three-point shot. “I wasn’t sure how it was gonna go; I wanted to attack the middle but they kept collapsing so we took the open shots and they knocked them down.”
It was more of the same in the third quarter. Every time Milford thought it might be able to close the gap, Morris would respond with another three-pointer. A Ross corner three with a minute to go in the third made it 59-43.
This came in the midst of a scoring flurry to end the third which resulted with the Mustangs holding a 63-45 entering the fourth quarter.
The threes continued to rain on both sides; at one point, four consecutive possessions resulted in three-pointers for both teams, with Morris going up 69-51 on the last of these.
Midway through the fourth Milford went on a quick 9-2 run to close the gap to 71-60. But Morris kept its composure and never let things get out of hand.
After being stuck one point shy of 1,000 for a decent stretch, Ross finally hit the magic milestone with a free throw at the 3:44 mark.
“For him to get it here was a really big deal,” Joy said of Ross. “It’s a credit to him. Last night we were talking about it in practice, where he was at. His answer was, ‘I’ve got another game after this. I don’t care, I just want to win.’ That speaks a lot about who he is as a person. He’s given everything he’s got.”
Both teams will have a bye to begin the Class D Section IV playoffs next week. Morris will be at Charlotte Valley in the 4 vs. 5 matchup while Milford will face either Schenevus or Roxbury as the two seed.
“We’re hitting sectionals how I’d want to go in,” Joy said. “We’re playing really well as a group. Individually, we’ve got guys who are doing a lot of really good things and I’m excited about sectionals. It should be fun this year.”
Morris 86, Milford 71
Mor … 16 23 24 23 — 86
Mil … 14 12 19 26 — 71
Mor: Tiger Ross 9 10-11 29, Asa Dugan 4 0-0 11, Ryan Murphy 3 4-4 11, Keegan Fraser 1 0-0 2, Jonah Baldo 1 0-2 2, Ty Turner 0 0-0 0, Carter Sawyer 9 0-0 25, Mark Hoyt 3 0-0 6. Totals: 30 14-17 86
Mil: Carter Stevens 5 3-6 14, Christian Lawson 7 10-13 26, Wyatt March 0 0-0 0, Braden Murphy 8 1-1 24, Tanner Greiner 0 1-4 1, Luke Edmonds 2 0-0 4, Landon Cohn 0 2-3 2, Noah Jubar 0 0-0 0, Isaac Wikoff 0 0-0 0. Totals: 22 17-27 71
Three-point baskets: Mor 12 (Ross, Dugan 3, Murphy, Sawyer 7); Mil 10 (Stevens, Lawson 2, Murphy 7)