Boys Basketball: Potomac Falls Plays the Spoiler as Panthers Knock off Briar Woods, Clearing Path for Loudoun Valley to Grab Dulles District Title

(Feb. 9, 2012) - After back-to-back state titles and enough hardware to fill up a trophy case at Potomac Falls High School you might think that senior Greg Graves would not relish playing the spoiler role in the Dulles District boys basketball race but a smile creased the 6-foot-7 Graves' face when asked that question after Wednesday's 50-43 win at Briar Woods.

"This game was important to us, especially after what happened at our place," said Graves.

What happened in the Panther Pit two weeks ago was a double overtime loss to the Falcons that touched off a three-game skid for Potomac Falls but on Wednesday the Panthers, with Mount Saint Mary's bound Graves scoring a game-high 21 points and 13 rebounds, not only captured their third straight win but ruined regular-season district title hopes for the short-handed Falcons.

Briar Woods (12-3 in Dulles, 16-5) needed to win two of its three final regular season games to wrap up the title but Briar Woods fell to Heritage Tuesday with senior point guard Myles Tate all with an illness and on Wednesday, while Tate was back, Briar Woods played without its top defender, Correy Facciane, who also averages 10.2 points a game.

The win by Potomac Falls (10-5, 14-7) opened the door for Loudoun Valley (13-2, 18-3), a team that has fallen to Briar Woods twice this year but beaten everybody else in district. A win by the Vikings Friday against Tuscarora (1-14, 2-19) will wrap up the title.


Briar Woods coach Mike Benson, while no doubt would have loved to raise a title banner in Brambleton, was looking at the bigger playoff picture when he ordered an ailing Facciane to stay home Wednesday -- and hopefully to prevent the illness from spreading to rest of his teammates. With 16 teams from Region II making the divisional playoffs, the Falcons and maybe more than half of the district will advance to that tournament. Next week's Dulles District tournament will be important in terms of how teams are seeded into Regionals.

The Panthers size inside against the Falcons gave Potomac Falls a huge rebounding edge, 48-30, and without a lot of second looks, Briar Woods needed a hot shooting night -- which isn't what happened as the Falcons shot just 22.8 percent (13 of 57) including 7 of 30 from 3-point range.

While Graves had a rim-rattling dunk -- a sighting as rare in Loudoun this winter as the snow flurries falling outside -- among his 16-point burst during the second and third quarters, the Panthers also got some key performances from freshman Wanya Allen who had nine rebounds, several nice assists and enough energy to light up all of Ashburn.

Also for Potomac Falls, the trio of senior Matt Galloway, junior Jordan Ferbrache and senior Todd Shanosky combined for 19 rebounds and enough points to keep the Falcons defense from collapsing on Graves.

Tate led Briar Woods with 13 and junior Jacob Ryan scored 11 with junior Kevin Galang getting 10.