DOVER - The pressure of tournament basketball catches up with the name-and-blame clubs of the county's Class B League at Memorial Hall tonight when the 11 members of the circuit begin their annual playoffs to determine their representatives in Sectional competition. Coming off a League race that was tight from the beginning to the end of the season and which ended in a 2-way tie for the Championship, the teams appear to be in top form for the 23rd Annual Tornament and ready to present fans the usual tiptop basketball that is expected of the competition.
Four games are on tonight's program with the 1st getting under way at 6PM and the others following at hourly intervals. The Mineral City Tigers with the poorest won-and-lost record of the 11 competing teams...only one victory in 16 games...takes on the Midvale Blue Devils with a mark of 10-8, in the opener. The Port Washington Purple Riders (8-8) plays the Tuscarawas Broncos (12-4) and Dundee Bulldogs (3-9) plays the Sugarcreek-Shanesville Pirates (17-3) at 8PM and Strasburg Tigers (17-2) plays the Bolivar Cardinals (6-14) at 9PM. The other 3 teams: Baltic Eagles - Stone Creek Golden Panthers and Gnadenhutten Indians all swing into action on Thursday night. While anything can happen in tournament play...and usually does...the teams with the better records are strictly the favorites in tonight's opening round of play.
Sugarcreek-Shanesville and Strasburg co-Champions of the League, finished the race with identical marks of 8 victories and 1 defeat are in opposite brackets of the drawing and have been posted as favorites to fight it out for the tournament title and The Daily Reporter Trophy. The Pirates of Head Coach Earl Sundheimer are defending the Championshi they won last season when they busted through the tournament with a mark of 24 straight victories and then went on to win 2 more games before suffering their 1st defeat and being eliminated from Regional play.
Sugarcreek-Shanesville won its tournament title from Tuscarawas by a 37-36 score in last year's tournament, while Midvale nosed out Strasburg 32-29 for the Consolation Division honor in a competition which broke all previous records with a total of 6,818 paying admission during the 2 weeks of games. Strasburg figured stronger than it finished last season, it is currently the hottest team in the circuit and will enter tonight's game with a string of 13 consecutive victories. Head Coach Emmet Riley's Tigers have not tasted defeat since December 19th when Sugarcreek-Shanesville reversed them 51-30 in a non-League game at Sugarcreek. They evened that score; however, in a League game at Strasburg later in the season, winning by a 44-29 count.
Thursday night's games pit the Baltic Eagles (8-5) against the Stone Creek Golden Panthers (1-13) at 7PM and the Gnadenhutten Indians (12-5) against the winner of the Mineral City-Midvale joust at 8PM and present the opening game of the Consolation Division with the losers of the Mineral City-Midvale and Port-Tusky games meeting at 9PM.
The tournament this year was split away from its usual Thursday-Friday-Saturday sessions because the Dover High School's Crimson Tornadoes have an important Central Ohio League game scheduled with Newark High School at the Hall Friday night. The Crimsons play at Dennison tonight and close their home season with the Newark game Friday.
Tuesday, February 13, 1945
The Daily Reporter
Dover, Ohio
TUSCARAWAS COUNTY CLASS B BASKETBALL LEAGUE (1944-45)
1. Strasburg Tigers (Emmet Riley-2) .900 (11th Title)
2. Sugarcreek-Shanesville Pirates (Earl Sundheimer-12) 9-1 .900 (5th Title)
3. Tuscarawas Broncos (Jim Rogers-2) 8-2 .800
4. Baltic Eagles (John M. McCormich-3) 6-4 .600
5. Gnadenhutten Indians (Jim Stubbins-1) 6-4 .600
6. Midvale Blue Devils (Travis White-2) 5-5 .500
7. Port Washington Purple Riders (L.A. Arrington-1) 5-5 .500
8. Dundee Bulldogs (J.H. Proper-1) 4-6 .400
9. Bolivar Cardinals (Sherwood Haueter-1) 2-9 .200
10. Stone Creek Golden Panthers (Gintz-1) 1-9 .100
11. Mineral City Tigers (Bill Sattler-2) 0-10 .000
TUSCARAWAS COUNTY CLASS B BASKETBALL SEASON (1944-45)
1. Strasburg Tigers 17-2 .894
2. Sugarcreek-Shanesville Pirates 17-3 .850
3. Tuscarawas Broncos 12-4 .750
4. Gnadenhutten Indians 12-5 .706
5. Midvale Blue Devils 10-8 .556
6. Baltic Eagles 8-5 .615
7. Port Washington Purple Riders 8-8 .500
8. Bolivar Cardinals 6-14 .300
9. Dundee Bulldogs 3-9 .250
10. Stone Creek Golden Panthers 1-13 .071
11. Mineral City Tigers 1-15 .063
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