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By Keagan Smith

Orange Leader

LIBERTY – The West Orange-Stark Mustangs’ season came to a close after a tough loss to the Huffman Falcons, 59-48 in the first round of the 4A Region III bidistrict playoffs on Saturday night at Panthers Gym at Liberty High School.

The Mustangs (11-15) battled hard against the 21-4A champion Falcons (25-1). After facing double-digit deficits late in the game, the Mustangs whittled down the Falcons’ lead to four with a little more than a minute remaining but Falcon standout Jacob Harvey, who had 32 points and four steals, and his teammates were able to keep the Mustangs at bay.

The Mustangs fared much better against Huffman Saturday than they did during the holidays when the Falcons downed WO-S 79-58 at Mustang Gym.

The Falcons pulled ahead to an early 15-10 lead after the first quarter. In the second quarter the Mustangs’ Bryon Keller led the team on a run, scoring eight points in the quarter. Eventually the Mustangs found their rhythm, pulling within two points at the half, 26-24.

Things began to go downhill for West Orange-Stark after halftime. Huffman’s Jacob Harvey drilled 3 consecutive buckets to start the third quarter. By the end of the third, the Falcons led 39-29.

The Mustangs played hard in the fourth and brought the deficit within 4 points but were never able to overtake their opponent by the final buzzer.

The Mustangs’ scoring leader was Quinton Proctor with 13 points plus five rebounds, while Bryon Keller was second on the team with 12 points.