Altoona Maroon tops White for Building II basketball crown

After a full summer session of play which featured 12 total teams from 11 different schools, it was the two Altoona teams that proved to be the cream of the crop in the Building II high school boys summer league.

Altoona White and Altoona Maroon battle it out in practices as teammates, but on Thursday night, the two split squads featuring Mountain Lion junior varsity players met for the championship of the long-running summer league.

White battled back to tie the contest, but Maroon was able to seize control back and never relinquish it in a 49-40 victory to claim the title.

"I feel like it's good to win the championship in general," Altoona Maroon's Nysir Shields said. "But I feel like beating our older team as the young bucks, I feel like that's much better. It gives us an extra confidence boost for when we get into the high school play, so when we have to play them again (in practice)."

The Maroon team is the younger group as it features all incoming freshmen, while White is the older with all incoming sophomores except with the addition of one soon-to-be junior.

The young Lions showed they will be pushing for minutes when the regular season rolls around as they led from the start, never trailed, and allowed White to tie it once around the nine minute to go mark.

"It feels really good, because we beat the older kids, so it feels really good," Altoona Maroon's Kionte Barnes said.

A bucket by Khyaire Hall allowed White to knot the game at 38-38, but Maroon responded immediately on the ensuing trip down the floor to regain the edge for good.

Nysir Shields used his strength inside to power up a layup to put his team back in front.

After teammate Ryan Daniels converted the first of two free throws to give Maroon a three-point advantage (41-38), Shields missed a pair of foul shots.

However, after the miss on the second attempt, Shields hustled for the loose ball before claiming it and sticking it back up and in while getting fouled for a 43-38 lead.

"I feel like this team (Altoona Maroon) runs on hustle," Shields said. "I feel like every time someone makes a hustle play, it boosts our morale for the rest of the game. That hustle play gave us a jump to go up."

While he came up short on the foul shots, Shields' hoop showed the grit and determination to help Maroon finish a 6-2 run to close things out.

Barnes, who led all scorers with 20 points, recorded five of those six points as Altoona White had trouble containing the young speedster with the dribble.

"I work on it (getting to the rim) everyday, all day," Barnes said. "So, it really comes easy to me when I'm going up (for layups off the drive)."

A bucket by Vince Nedimyer III were the last points of the evening for White.

Altoona Maroon got off to a 7-2 spurt at the outset as Barnes had five of the points.

The lead ballooned to eight (10-2) when Zyell Miller drilled a triple.

The older Mountain Lions climbed back within one at 13-12 when Leighton Johnson buried a 3-pointer with eight minutes left in the first half.

However, eight unanswered points from Maroon shot its lead back up to nine at 21-12 after Miller made good on an old-fashioned three-point play.

Altoona White immediately responded with a 10-5 burst to get within 26-22 before Maroon netted the last four points of the opening half to stake itself to a 30-22 edge.

"This is really fun because we do this every day by practicing hard with each other, Barnes said. "It's fun to play against each other."

The veteran Lions came out after the brief halftime, and reeled off 14 of the first 24 points to get to within two points at 38-36.

In the run, White closed the deficit to one point on two separate occasions as two buckets from Hall made the scores 35-34 and 37-36.

After Barnes made the second of two foul shots to push the Maroon advantage up to 38-36 before Hall would tie the contest on the next White trip down their offensive side.

"I feel like playing them (Altoona White), we know that if they get a lead that they'll keep going and going," Shields said. "I feel like when we locked in after they tied the game, that gives us the upper hand for the rest of the game."

ALTOONA MAROON (49): Barnes 7 4-6 20, Cobbler 0 0-2 0, Muccitelli 0 0-2 0, Miller 2 4-7 9, Rader 1 0-0 2, Daniels 4 1-2 11, Shields 3 1-5 7. Totals -- 17 10-24 49.

ALTOONA WHITE (40): Johnson 5 1-3 13, Hall 7 0-1 16, Cox 1 0-0 2, Nedimyer III 2 1-2 5, Kessinger 2 0-0 4. Totals -- 17 2-6 40.

SCORE BY QUARTERS

Altoona Maroon 30 19 -- 49

Altoona White 22 18 -- 40

3-point goals: Altoona Maroon 5 (Barnes 2, Daniels 2, Miller); Altoona White 4 (Johnson 2, Hall 2).