For one half, the Boothbay-Madison boys basketball tournament match-up lived up to its billing. The two Mountain Valley Conference foes split their two regular season contests and the expectation was the No. 3 versus No. 6 match-up would be a nail bitter.

Madison entered the Class C South tournament seeded third with a 15-3 record. The Bulldogs lost twice to No.1 and undefeated Winthrop and once to No.6 Boothbay. The teams exchange lead several times in the first half and were tied 21-21 with about two minutes remaining.  But the Bulldogs forged ahead outscoring  Boothbay 7-4 in taking a 28-25 lead into intermission.

Seahawk point guard Kyle Ames scored 12 first half point, but the Bulldogs held him scoreless in the second half, as Madison pulled away with 63-41 victory at the Augusta Civic Center.

As the game progressed, the Seahawks struggled to score against Madison’s tough man-to-man defense. The Bulldogs ended the third period leading by 15 points resulting in Boothbay abandoning its zone defense to play man-to- man. The combination of the Bulldog defense shutting down Ames and the Seahawks changing their defensive alignment spelled doom for Boothbay’s tournament fortunes.

“We’re not a very good man-to-man defense. We didn’t have anybody who could guard Morales and we had trouble with their big guy (Mitchell Jarvais),” Pinkham said.

But the Seahawks stayed close as long as Ames scored. He scored all 12 of his points in the first half.  Once Bulldog point guard Nicholas Morales increased his defensive pressure, the Seahawk offense began to struggle.

“They did a great job defensively on us, especially the kid guarding Kyle; he did an exceptional job,” Pinkham said. “Offensively we didn’t get much movement and had too much standing around so Kyle didn’t have anybody to pass to.”

Boothbay headed into the 2017 tournament on a roll. The Seahawks won five of their last six games including a 48-37 victory over Madison on Jan. 25. Boothbay began the season without senior captain Jacob Leonard and lost three of its first four games including a 58-50 loss to Madison on Dec. 13. But the Bulldogs proved to be too much in the rubber match. Madison, led by shooting guard Sam Whalen’s 16 points, forward Mitchell Jarvis’ 13 points and Morales’ 12, dominated the Seahawks in the second half.

According to Pinkham, the Seahawks improved as the season progressed due to their hard work and positive attitude. “They are really a great bunch of kids,” he said. “They tried to do everything I asked them and played hard and were a fun group to watch.”

Boothbay ends its season 12-8. Madison advances to regional semifinal on Thursday against No. 7 Waynflete, a Portland private school, who upset No. 2 Richmond in overtime in their quarterfinal match-up.