Pleasant Valley head coach Matt Gould has been stressing the importance of hard work to his players all season. The Bears respond with exactly that; however, up to this point, the team amassed only one win.

Mentally, Gould had his concerns about his team's mounting frustration and its toll it may take on the squad.The hard work paid off last night, however, as a fourth quarter surge aided in a big Eastern Pennsylvania Conference win over Bethlehem Catholic, 77-68."They know the feeling of putting in the hard work and having it pay off," Gould admits. "But recently, we lost some tough games that we had chances to be in. Liberty and Bangor were both hard losses, so this is great to have that mental set of working hard and having the crowd behind them and coming through with the win."With the score tied 50-50 after three periods, the game's outcome was remaining in the balance. That's when the long-distance shooting of the Bears (nine treys), made a large impact. Bryan Sharpe, Kevin Wisser and Nyiem Nevarez hit consecutive triples to ignite the decisive fourth frame and begin a 14-1 run, that provided the Bears (2-6 overall, 2-4 league) with a 64-51 lead with 4:48 left."That run just boosted our guys up and the fans were into the game, and the guys haven't felt that excitement up to this point this year," Gould related. "It was just a great team victory by the guys. They came together, worked hard in practice and hopefully it continues."Early on, the Bears held a slim lead throughout the first frame, before DeAndre Tillet's three-pointer gave the Golden Hawks a 22-21 lead after one. Tillet's seven points countered six apiece from Sharpe and Wisser in the session.In the second, Becahi used an 11-0 run to move out to a 33-23 lead with 5:30 left before half. However, the Bears battled back and trailed 41-35 at the intermission. Chance Neilly's nine points and six from teammate Andrew Posch highlighted the Hawks' big period, while Eric Marbury kept the winners close with five.At the break, the Bears made a subtle defensive switch on Neilly, as Pleasant Valley limited the Hawks to nine points in the third.Nine turnovers by Beca in the third allowed the Bears to claw their way back into the game, as they tied it up at 50-all, behind Marbury's six points, going into the final session."It's been a hard season so far, playing against this good competition in our league," Marbury admitted. "(Bethlehem Catholic) played really good defense as a team, and played strong position defense, so I just went out there and tried to feed my teammates, give them confidence, and then hit the shots that I got."The PV guard led his team with 18 points and nine assists. Nevarez added 15, Sharpe contributed 13, while Ron Moore and Wisser both chipped in with 11.Neilly led all scorers with 22 points, while Posch finished with 21.Beca held a 35-27 edge in rebounds but committed 21 turnovers to 10 for the Bears.PV also won the JV game as Mike Mitchell's 20 points led to a 60-58 victory.BECAHINeilly 7-5-6-22, Swan 2-1-2-5, Maff 0-0-0-0, Simmons 0-0-0-0, Tillet 6-2-2-18, Lambert 0-0-0-0, Posch 7-7-9-21, Solaam 1-0-1-2. TOTALS: 23-15-20-68.PLEASANT Vy.Mikulski 2-0-0-5, Nevarez 3-7-9-15, Marbury 6-5-10-18, Moore 5-1-6-11, Wisser 3-2-2-11, Sharpe 4-3-4-13, Shaffner 2-0-0-4. TOTALS: 25-18-31-77.Becahi 22 19 9 18 - 68Pleas. Vy. 21 14 15 27 - 77Three pointers: BC - Tillet 4, Neilly 3; PV - Wisser 3, Nevarez 2, Sharpe 2, Marbury 1, Mikulski 1.