toledoblade.com --

There was still a flicker of hope midway through the third quarter yesterday for a Central Catholic basketball team trying to catch lightning in a bottle for the second time this season.

But that's as far as fourth-ranked Libbey would let it go.

The Cowboys (21-2) took command over the final 12 minutes, turning a modest six-point lead into a 67-38 victory in a Division II boys district final played before a standing-room-only crowd of more than 3,000 fans at Perrysburg.

Libbey avenged its 65-63 City League loss at Central on Dec. 14, and sent the Cowboys into a regional semifinal with eighth-ranked Columbus Eastmoor Academy at 8:15 p.m. Thursday at Anderson Arena in Bowling Green.

William Buford topped Libbey with 19 points and 11 rebounds, and Julius Wells added 14 points and 10 boards.

Brad Sandridge contributed nine points, Brad Burton had seven points and seven rebounds, and Tony Brown and Lance Jones rounded things out with eight and seven points, respectively in the ninth straight win for the two-time defending CL champion Cowboys.

"They didn't want to go home," Cowboys coach Leroy Bates said. "They didn't like that feeling [loss to St. John's in D-I district final] last year."

Can his team go all the way?

Libbey's Julius Wells blocks a shot by Central Catholic's Matt Collins. Wells finished with 14 points and 10 rebounds.

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"Plenty of teams feel that way," Bates said. "It's just a matter of execution and keeping the guys focused to execute our offensive and defensive schemes. If we can do that then I think we'll come out fine."

The Cowboys trailed only once in the game, that at 2-0, and led 13-8 after one quarter. Libbey's oppressive defense forged an 18-2 run, which was capped on Buford's lone 3-pointer of the game 2:09 before halftime for a 27-10 lead.

"We've wanted them since they beat us," Buford said. "We stayed with a focused approach and kept playing hard. We knew we had to stay aggressive on defense and just keep playing together.

"We just don't want to go home early. It's our senior year and we want to win a state championship and leave with a bang."

Central (14-9) refused to crumble, answering with a 10-0 stretch of its own. The Irish scored the last five points of the first half and the first five after halftime to pull within 27-20 on a 3-pointer from Tory Villolovos (14 points) 43 seconds into the third quarter.

Central was still within striking range down 30-24 after a layup from Cory Lehman (12 points) with 4:24 left in the third. But Libbey used a 14-2 surge and gained a 44-30 lead on Sandridge's 18-footer with 6:05 left in the game.

The Cowboys outscored the Irish 29-12 in the final quarter, when Wells scored 10 of his points.

"That was great motivation," Wells said of the Dec. 14 upset. "We knew we could beat them, but we just weren't focused going into that game. Coach Bates made sure we stayed focused this time. We came out ready and you see what the result was.

"Our offense feeds off our defense, so we just lock down on defense and we're ready to go."

Libbey was 25-of-50 (50 percent) from the field, 11-of-21 from the line, and outrebounded the Irish 38-31. Cold-shooting Central was 13-of-46 (28 percent) from the field and 8-for-21 at the line.

"We were down 12 at halftime and felt like we could chip away at some things," Central coach Paul Patterson said. "We came out and scored five quick points, then kind of went into a [lull] and they were able to keep building it up. That's what a great team does.

"That's a great group of kids over there at Libbey. We didn't really have much offense, but our kids kept fighting away. It's tough when you run into a buzz saw like the Libbey Cowboys."

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