WHITE RIVER JUNCTION — Decades ago, during a wacky period in U.S. history known as the 1970s, children sometimes amused and frustrated themselves with a board game generally known as electric football.
Magnetic pieces in the shape of players could be positioned on the elevated, metal field and a switch thrown, which caused the surface to vibrate and buzz and the pieces to move randomly and in frenzied fashion.
Wednesday’s boys basketball clash between visiting Woodstock and Hartford in the Vermont Division II playoffs brought electric football to mind. The neighboring rivals met for the third time this winter during a fast-paced contest played in front of a near-capacity crowd in Hanley Gymnasium.
Sixth-seeded Hartford prevailed, 71-58, during a contest overflowing with turnovers, missed shots, lengthy pass attempts, and tumbling, stumbling, jumping action under the hoops.
“I would like to clean our game up, but it’s who we are,” said Hartford coach Jeff Thomas, a former Woodstock bench boss whose current team advanced to play at third-seeded Spaulding at 7 p.m. Saturday. “It’s like street ball, but when I get upset and try to do otherwise, we don’t play well.
“We are who we are after 20 games and we’re not going to change.”
Fair enough. Let the good times and the basketball roll, carom and skip. Wednesday, the Hurricanes (16-5) pressed the Wasps to distraction, rebounded with vigor and fed off a rowdy student section.
“I hadn’t heard that gym like that in a long time, so that was exciting,” Thomas said. “But we have to make some tweaks and play better against Spaulding.”
Tarin Prior sank a quartet of three-point shots, laid in several breakaway buckets and continued his case for being Hartford’s best all-around athlete. The senior was a soccer standout before successfully switching to football last fall and will be a fourth-year goaltending starter in lacrosse, the sport he’ll likely play in college.
“He’s averaged maybe 13 points a night and played good-but-not-great defense,” Thomas said, noting that Prior had six assists against Woodstock. “But tonight, he played great defense. He rebounded and he took the team on his back and led by example and by communication. That was the Tarin Prior we need.”
Cooper Jones came off the bench to lead the 11th-seeded Wasps with 22 points, 17 during the second half.
Hartford led, 25-7, after a quarter and 31-20 at halftime. The Wasps (8-13), hampered by fouls on guards Corey White and Cooper Dorsogna, nonetheless pulled within 38-32 with three minutes remaining in the third quarter.
Hartford answered with a 10-0 run during a 1-minute, 20-second span and the game was effectively over, Prior posting eight of his points during the third quarter’s final 2:25.
“We missed a lot of shots that we’ve made during the past couple of weeks,” said Woodstock coach Steve Landon, who previously coached at Hartford. “If we don’t shoot well around the rim and at the free-throw line, we don’t have a lot of success. Especially against a team like (Hartford) that can score at such a fast pace.”
The Hurricanes’ Jacob Seaver had 19 points and Brody Tyburski added nine points. Woodstock received 16 points from Declan McCullough and eight points from White.
Notes: Spaulding, which knocked Hartford out of last season’s playoffs, is 20-2. … Wall decorations in the Hartford coaches room include one of Thomas’ mounted deer heads. The veteran coach, recently hired as White River Valley’s principal, said he once had three of them in his office earlier in his career. … The Hurricanes previously beat Woodstock, 65-50, and 69-59, this season. … Former Dartmouth College men’s basketball coach Dave Faucher attended the game, sitting in the front row. … Landon said his team practiced without masks for the first time this season on Tuesday. … Word in the stands was that onetime Hartford baseball coach Jarrod Grassi, who resigned in last April, has moved to Oregon.
Tris Wykes can be reached at twykes@vnews.com.