Maurice Helwick, superintendent of Strasburg schools and a member of the Eastern Ohio District Athletic Board, presents the Class A District Championship Trophy to Senior members of the Tiger squad and Head Coach Charles Huggins. Receiving the award are: Gene Bayer, Charles Jones, Tim Ferris, John Studer, Gary Phillips and Ed Yackey.
STEBENVILLE - Thousands of fans in Steubenville's Diocesan Arena witnessed Strasburg's powerful Tigers (23-0) roll into Regional Tournament play Saturday night by defeating Mt. Pleasant (18-5) 69-51. The Bengals now move into Canton's "sweet 16" opposite Northwestern's Huskies, who owned East Canton 52-34 in another Saturday District finale. Smoothness was not one of Strasburg's strong points in capturing the Class A Eastern District Crown. Rather it was a stranglehold defense that offset a sputtering offense until the Bengal bombers could find the range.
After that, Strasburg's heavy artillery took over to blast the Mounties off the tournament trail. The Mounties, fresh from a big upset over Dennison St. Mary's, appeared a threat throughout the 1st quarter as the Strasburg scoring machine couldn't get cranked up. However, the Tigers managed to slip into a 6-5 first quarter lead on the strength of a highly touted defense which limited Mt. Pleasant to one basket and 3 fouls. Tourney jitters seemed temporarily in command as 13 turnovers marred 1st quarter play, 7 by Strasburg, 6 by Mt. Pleasant.
The usually hot-handed Tigers connected on 2 of 11 action shots and the Mounties 1 of 10, but it was just a matter of time as Mt. Pleasant couldn't match the board strength of the taller Tigers. All-Ohio John Studer, Strasburg's big bomber, seemed to bide his time looking the situation over a bit until 5:52 remained in the 2nd period when he scored his 1st goal. From then on the talented Tiger swished 13 of 20 from the floor and 6 of 8 from the foul line to set the pace with 32 points before leaving the floor with 2 minutes remaining. Ed Rusk, the lone underclassman in the starting lineup, lefthanded 17 through the hoop as he too picked up momentum in the 2nd quarter.
A commendable job by Gene Bayer, who is taking over the spot of injured Ed Yackey, was lauded by all of his teammates after the game. The 6-4 Senior stood out under the backboards on defense and scored 9 points to add confidence to Tiger backers. Charlie Jones, Gary Phillips and Mike Reiger shared the guard duties to keep the Tiger machine rolling. Strasburg never really got off its feet until Studer popped his 1st fielder. At that time the score was 10-10 and the Mounties seemed to be quite a pesky little group. But, within 1 minute the Bengals snared a 10 point lead as Studer canned 3 jumpers, Rusk ripped one from the side and Bayer bucketed 1 from about 12 feet. Strasburg cut the cords for 23 in the 2nd stanza to Mt. Pleasnat's 11 and from then on it was "no sweat" for the terrific Tigers. As it has on numerous occasions in the past, defense surely has to be recognized as the Mt. Pleasant aggregation was held to its lowest output of the year.
The Mounties' high scoring ace Mark Thompson was limited to a lone fielder and 6 fouls as he was repeatedly stopped from his driving antics that had built him a 25 point average per game. Mt. Pleasant was limited to 19 field goals and in the losers dressing room after the game, it was repeated that Strasburg's defense was the toughest thing faced all year. Ed Kubat, Husky guard, paced the Mt. Pleasant output with 15 markers 6 of them coming in the last period. The losers attempted 53 shots from the floor and connected on 19 for a 35.8 percent. Strasburg rang up 24 of 49 shots for 48.9 percent and controlled the boards 31-19.
STRASBURG TIGERS - 69
John Studer 13-5-32
Ed Rusk 6-5-17
Gene Bayer 2-5-9
Charlie Jones 2-4-8
Gary Phillips 0-0-0
Mike Reiger 1-0-2
Ron Hall 0-0-0
Tom Hall 0-0-0
Art Haswell 0-0-0
Tom Ferris 0-1-1
Tom Margo 0-0-0
MT. PLEASANT MOUNTIES - 51
Mark Thompson 1-6-8
Jeff Timko 1-1-3
Ron Thompson 3-1-7
Gary Schrickel 0-0-0
Ed Kubat 7-1-15
Cleaver 0-0-0
Yost 1-0-2
Witherow 0-4-4
Winfield Robson 5-0-10
Monday, March 6, 1967
Ed Smith
The Daily Reporter
Dover, Ohio
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