“It was a fistfight really,” said Johnstown coach Phil Satterlee. “It wasn’t necessarily the best offensive basketball game, on either side. We just had to value our possessions and not settle for the first scoring opportunity, but to move the basketball and try to get the best opportunity.”

After a slow start, the Sir Bills began to put things together on defense and were able to hit some shots down the stretch, securing a 47-34 victory.

“It’s a big win, right before Christmas,” Johnstown junior Braeden Fennessey said. “We handled the ball pretty well, we were taking good shots and weren’t giving the ball away.”

After Scotia-Glenville worked its way out to a lead through the first quarter, 13-10, the Johnstown defense limited the Tartans to just six points in the second, and three points in the third.

Fennessey posted a game-high 15 points, including seven in the third quarter, helping the Sir Bills build a lead. The Sir Bills hit eight 3-pointers in the game, with four shots from beyond the arc coming from Fennessey.

Despite the low-scoring contest, Johnstown had four players score in double digits. Daniel Brown contributed 11 points for the Sir Bills, while Dylan Hulbert and Travis Tallon both had 10.

“We executed what we needed to do in the third quarter, and really limited them on offense,” Satterlee said. “We were able to get a couple buckets to get some separation and control the rest of the game.”

“Scotia defended, they were a tough team, and we were able to overcome that today.”

The win was the second of the season for Johnstown, after defeating Canajoharie last Wednesday.

“We came into the game knowing that we didn’t have the greatest start to the season, but if we continue to play as a team, things will start to go our way,” Fennessey said. “We had a game plan today and we executed it right.”

“This is a younger group. We have a lot of guys who didn’t have varsity experience coming in,” Satterlee added. “We’ve kind of labeled this group as a lightbulb team. We’re waiting for those lightbulbs to turn on, for them to figure out what it takes what we need to do to be successful. Our game against Canajoharie was the best we’ve played all year, and the blub was flickering a little bit. Today, we came out and did what we had to do, and hopefully we can continue this momentum.”

The Sir Bills and Tartans will face off against each other again next week on Monday at 1:30 p.m., for another non-league matchup.

Scotia-Glenville 13 6 3 12 – 34

Johnstown 10 11 11 15 – 47

Scotia-Glenville scoring: Fiori 1-0-2, Stark 3-0-7, Martin 1-0-2, Kristel 0-1-1, Stegmann 2-0-4, Peters 1-0-3, Cruz 7-1-15. Johnstown scoring: Hulbert 4-0-10, Bramer 0-1-4, Brown 3-4-11, Tallon 4-1-10, Fennessey 5-1-15. Team scoring: Scotia-Glenville 15-2-34; Johnstown 16-7-47.