INDIANA, Pa. — For 16 minutes, the A-C Valley boys basketball team was penning quite an underdog story.

But just like that, Blairsville broke out the red pen and started editing away.

The Bobcats outscored A-C Valley 40-11 over a 12-minute span to spoil the yarn the Falcons were trying to weave on the way to a 73-53 win in the first round of the PIAA Class A playoffs at Indiana (Pa.) University Friday night.

"We were right where we wanted to be," said A-C Valley coach Jim Marron. "We just got cold in the third quarter."

A-CValley (20-8) led 26-21 with 10 seconds remaining in the second quarter before MarkDemarines hit a 3-pointer from NBA range to cut the lead to two points.

Demarines had a knack of hitting late 3-pointers. He also hit one at the buzzer to end the first quarter.

He was the only one hitting shots for Blairsville (26-2) in the first half and finished with 17 points.

The Bobcats missed their first nine shots of the game and were only 9 of 38 from the floor in the first two quarters.

Despite their woes and trailing at halftime, Blairsville coach Mark Rydbom said there was no cause of concern.

"There was no panic," he said. "We have a pretty veteran group and the layups that we were missing, we knew we weren't going to miss all night."

Andy Ostach, who finished with a game-high 21 points for Blairsville, had a particularly tough time of it in the first half.

He missed his first four shots — all in the paint — and was just 3 of 13 from the field.

"That's probably more misses than he's had all year," Rydbom said.

He didn't miss in the second half.

His teammates didn't miss many, either.

A-CValley did miss — a lot. The Falcons shot a dismal 3 of 22 in the third quarter to fall behind by 12.

JohnKaufman led A-CValley with 16 points. He hit three big 3-pointers in the first half to give the Falcons the lead.

But he, like the rest of his teammates, turned frigid in the final 16 minutes.

"We made them work," Rydbom said. "They worked so hard in the first half to get the lead that they didn't have their legs in the second half."

Sean Foust added 12 points for A-CValley.

It was the final game for Foust, who was a three-time all-Keystone ShortwayAthletic Conference selection, Kaufman, Ted Marron and Kyle McCall.

"I couldn't be prouder of these kids," Marron said."

A-C VALLEY 53Ryan Jackson 3-8 2-4 8, Sean Foust 4-14 4-6 12, Kyle McCall 2-9 1-2 5, Shawn Courson 2-11 3-4 9, Mark Hart 0-0 0-2 0, John Kaufman 5-11 2-2 16, Ted Marron 1-7 0-3 3, Garrett Greathouse 0-1 0-0 0, Mike Himes 0-0 0-0 0, Nate Silvis 0-1 0-0 0, Willie Thomas 0-0 0-0 0, Kyle Hirsch 0-0 0-0 0, Brandon Eiler 0-0 0-0 0, JohnStumpner 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 17-61 12-21 53

BLAIRSVILLE 73Ada Highberger 5-13 1-1 14, Mark Demarines 6-12 2-4 17, CalebFritz 0-0 0-0 0, Zach Sabella 1-5 1-2 3, Brett Gunder 1-3 2-2 4, NickStone 2-6 0-0 5, Andy Ostach 9-19 3-5 21, Jerome Nadeo 2-4 3-6 7, Cory Manarelli 0-2 1-2 1, Aaron Williams 0-0 0-0 0, JustinMcGinnis 0-0 0-0 0, Justin Palmer 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 26-64 14-24 73

A-C Valley 10 16 7 20—53Blairsville 10 14 21 28—733-point goals: Courson 2, Kaufman 4, Marron, Highberger 3, Demarines 3