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Bellwood-Antis knew coming into the season finale last night in Bellwood that they had to come out with a win to hold their No. 4 position in the District 6 3A boys basketball rankings, and with the game on the line, the Blue Devils pulled out a win to beat Mount Union.

With seconds left on the clock, B-A had a nail-biter on their hands with the score only separated by 3 points. After a foul on the part of Bellwood-Antis senior Clay Engle, the Trojans pulled within a point of tying the Blue Devils and sending the game into overtime, but after B-A senior Jack Showalter drew a foul with two seconds left in the game, their fate seemed sealed. Showalter hit one of his shots and B-A came out with a 62-60 win.

“Both teams played very well and it came out a close game. We did what we were told by our coaches and came out on top with the dub (win),” said junior Mason Yingling.

The Blue Devils were led by their senior trio of Trent Walker, Clay Engle, and Tanner Worthing, who combined for all but ten of B-A’s points last night. Walker led the pack with 28 points and Engle followed up with a 15 points, 14 of which came from 2 point shots.

Despite this win, the Blue Devils came out of the gates slow against the Trojans. After the first quarter the Devils were already behind by 8, and but by half they cut that down to a one point deficit. Mount Union fired back though, and forced Bellwood-Antis to put up 22 points in the fourth quarter in order to win the game.

The Blue Devils had a fire lit under them when despite being fourth seed in the District 6 3A rankings, they were beaten out in the Altoona Mirror’s Fab Five list, a list of the top 5 basketball teams in each division, to Everett, a team the boys had already beaten once this year. This gave them something to prove and something that with a win over Mount Union, they did prove.