Craig Daily Press

Eagle-Vail — Saturday night’s game between the Moffat County and Battle Mountain boys basketball teams was typical February basketball — intense, raucous, physical and desperate.

And in the end, the visiting Bulldogs had just a little bit more of the aformentioned qualities, beating the Huskies, 60-55, and taking a large step toward a state playoff berth.

“This was a big win,” said Bulldogs coach Steve Maneotis, whose team upped its record to 7-6 in the 4A Western Slope League, and 8-13 overall.

“This is a win that really keeps us in the playoff picture. If we take care of business, we should be in the playoffs (in fourth place in WSL). We came in here and played a good game on both ends.

“We’re in control of our destiny. If we can go win at Eagle Valley, we’ll be in the playoffs.”

Moffat County heads to Gypsum on Friday night to face the Devils, and will likely be facing a familiar scenario as the Bulldogs did Saturday night: Playing a team that’s out of the playoff hunt on its senior night.

Battle Mountain (2-10 and 4-15), to its credit, gave the Bulldogs everything they could handle in a very physical game.

“We were just missing one more guy who had a little bit more meat who could have been a little more physical to keep control in that second and third quarter,” Huskies coach Philip Tronsrue said. “They were running (Blake Najera, J.T. Hadden and Chayton Owens) on doubles and posts. We couldn’t stay up with the physical-ness.”

It was Owens who did the most damage, scoring a game-high 29 points, most of which came in the paint, an area Moffat County dominated.

“I think we did a really good job in the paint,” Maneotis said. “Our job was to try to get their two power players (Kyle Woolley and Ashlin Romero) into some foul trouble. We didn’t do that, but we did do a good job in the paint and we took better care of the basketball.”

The Bulldogs built a six-point lead in the second quarter and carried assorted Battle Mountain charges for the rest of the game. Eli Buckner had 10 points for Moffat County, while Najera had nine.

For the Huskies it was another tight loss in league play to Moffat County. The Bulldogs topped Battle Mountain, 71-69, in overtime in Craig last month. On Senior Night, Huskies senior Ashlin Romero led the way with 27 points, while Kyle Woolley had 10. Before the game, the team honored all its seniors, including Travis Valdez, Byron Pottoroff, Victor Rios and Jeremy Windham.

Their coach said that the Class of 2008 had made great contributions to the program.

“We’ve dropped four games by a total of 13 points,” Tronsrue said. “That’s the difference between being almost .500 and being 4-15. We’ve made great strides. We’re playing harder. Guys are playing together.”