Interesting night at The Nest

Friday night's basketball game between Rocky Grove and Farrell was ... interesting... umm, to say the least.

It had a lot of stuff going on.

Due to an incident earlier in the year between the two schools, a couple of members of the Venango County sheriff's department had a very visible presence.

But energy in the room remained high from the beach themed super fans. ​

And so did the energy on the court with fast-paced play and the intense activity of the little peas inside the three referees' whistles.

On the court there appeared to be fouls that weren't followed by whistles, and whistles that did not seem to be proceeded by fouls and whistles that went off the same time as other whistles for conflicting calls. There were a lot of whistles.

There was also a fair amount of confusion. So much so that at one point the confusion led to a slam dunk in the wrong basket. 

There was an abundance of penalty free throws due to five technical fouls and one flagrant foul. There was just a lot of fouls - 50 according to one fan. 

There may have been record broken for referee huddles at mid court to discuss calls, miscalls and changes to calls. Players stood around dumbfounded waiting for decision after decision. Fans were often left wondering what and why a call was made, changed, added to or altered, regardless of how loud they yelled out for explanations. ​​

The game also paused for a fan ejection. Coaches for both teams appeared to be reprimanded by the refs throughout the evening and one coach jumped up and down in the style of a temper tantrum at one point.  

And in between it all, two teams of kids on the verge of becoming adults tried to play a game.

Farrell came into the game in first place and undefeated in Region 1. Rocky Grove was standing in fourth place with only one region win. In their first region contest, the Steelers beat the Orioles 74-36. It was going to be an uphill battle for the home team from the start.

And they battled for the first nine minutes of the contest, going toe to toe with Farrell thanks to Blayne Baker, Evan Wolfgong, Quinn Ritchey and Noah Baughman scoring the 10 first quarter points. At the 7:16 mark of the second quarter, Alex Zinz put up two to tie the game at 12-12. Then Farrell took control and ran away with the game, scoring 15 unanswered points.

Rocky Grove was struck by early foul trouble for two starters and an injury from a player off the bench. Freshman Landon Carter stopped the bleeding with a three pointer with only 12 seconds left in the half. ​

Farrell was ahead 27-15 when everyone hit the locker rooms at the half. 

There was confusion at the start of the third quarter and Rocky Grove couldn't overcome aggressive defense by Farrell. While they managed more points in the second half than the first, they were unable to keep pace with the Steelers. 

The Orioles improved from their first meeting with Farrell scoring more and holding the Steelers to fewer losing 65-38. ​

While Farrell had three players in double digits, Rocky Grove did not manage even one. Wolfgong led the team with eight points, Ritchey had seven, Baker had five. Zinz, Schiffer Anderson and D'Andre Whitmore each had four and freshman Baughman and Landon Carter contributed three a piece. 

Rocky Grove ends their regular season next week with a game in Jamestown on Tuesday and Senior Night at home Friday against Commodore Perry.