AUGUSTA — In the regular season, no opponent stayed within 18 points of the Forest Hills High School boys basketball team. As the Western Class D tournament began, coach Anthony Amero drove into his team’s head that those days were over. Somebody is going to hang with you, he told the Tigers.

“Somebody’s going to challenge you guys, and you’ve just got to know you can come back,” Amero said.

On Saturday afternoon, Hyde hung with the Tigers for most of the game, but in the fourth quarter, Forest Hills pulled away. The Tigers made 16 free throws in the fourth quarter, pulling away from the Phoenix for a 64-50 win.

Forest Hills (21-0), the top seed in the Western D tournament, is off to the state championship game for the third time in four seasons. The Tigers will face Fort Fairfield (18-4) in the Class D title game next Saturday at the Cross Insurance Center in Bangor. No. 3 Hyde ends the season at 16-5.

Forest Hills senior forward Ryan Petrin scored 32 points and grabbed 18 rebounds — including 11 offensive boards — and was named the tournament MVP.

“All coach says is, if we’re within 10 going into the fourth quarter, we’re fine,” Petrin said.

The Tigers actually had a 34-33 lead going into the fourth quarter, but Amero wanted his team to recall its rally from a 19-point deficit to beat Hyde in the regional final in 2012.

“We haven’t seen anybody who has five athletes like (Hyde), let alone two kids off the bench. We just haven’t seen that caliber of a team. We tried to work a lot against our alumni guys. Those guys are in their early 20s. Those guys come in and we scrimmage them periodically throughout the season,” Amero said. “We just kept telling the kids, keep it to within 10 going into the fourth quarter and it’s yours.”

“They were definitely the most physical (opponent),” Petrin said. “They were a good opponent.”

Forest Hills scored the first seven points of the fourth quarter to push its lead to 41-33 on a Petrin layup with five minutes, four seconds to play. While the Phoenix cut the deficit to four, the game became a war of attrition for Hyde, as key players began fouling out. The first was Andrew Palermo with 3:29 to play. Twenty-six seconds later, Greg Kidger fouled out. With 2:49 to play, it was Shemar Jack, and finally, with 1:54 to play, Hyde’s leading scorer Antoine Montgomery fouled out.

“Defensively, I think we were solid for a while. We tried to make it tough inside on them,” Hyde coach Corey Begley said. “It’s happened before. It’s not getting into position with the box out. We couldn’t get the big stop.”

After making just 5 of 10 foul shots in the first half, the Tigers improved at the line in the second, making 23 of 35. Forest Hills finished making 62 percent of their free throws.

“That’s always been a nemesis for us. In years we’ve been knocked out of the tournament, we’ve shot 35, 40 percent (at the line),” Amero said.

While the Phoenix worked defensively in the paint, the Tigers took it to the low post at every opportunity. That was the plan, Petrin said.

“Coach (Amero) said to get inside and see if we can get them in foul trouble, and in the first quarter, we got them in foul trouble pretty quick. All we wanted to do was pound it in the paint and try to get their starters out,” Petrin said.

Defensively, the Tigers worked on defending Montgomery tightly. Specifically, Forest Hills had Brandon Ouellette guard Montgomery, with other Tigers working to close his passing lanes. Amero noticed in Hyde’s other tournament games, when defenders came to help on a driving Montgomery, the junior would dish the ball to a teammate for an easy layup. While Montgomery scored 24 points, no other Hyde player scored more than 10.

The defensive strategy also meant that Ouellette, who set a Western Class D tournament record with eight 3-pointers in a semifinal win over Seacoast Christian, would not be as involved in the Tigers offense.

“They don’t care who gets what credit. Today’s Brandon’s job was to stop the Montgomery kid. That was Brandon’s job today, and Brandon knew he wasn’t going to score,” Amero said. “(Montgomery’s) a smart player. … We knew he’d get some points, but we weren’t going to let those other guys get free layups. We’re not going to lose on layups.”

The Phoenix took an early 13-4 lead with a 9-0 run in the first quarter. The Tigers answered with a 9-0 run of their own to tie the game midway through the second quarter. Through the second and third quarters, the teams traded the lead six times.

Tanner Daigle had 13 points and eight rebounds for Forest Hills. Last season, the Tigers fell to rival Valley in the regional semifinals. This season, the Tigers used that loss as inspiration.

“That didn’t feel very good, going home early last season. When it happened, we went home, we talked, and we were like ‘We have to work on our shooting,'” Petrin said. “All the teams last year packed it in the paint and wouldn’t let us inside, and we weren’t that good of a shooting team. We just worked on shooting all summer.”

Travis Lazarczyk — 861-9242

tlazarczyk@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @TLazarczykMTM

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