Pottsville's tremendously talented basketball team never let its ego get in the way of another impressive win Monday evening at Tamaqua.

On Saturday, the Crimson Tide had set asunder one of the state's top ranked 4A teams (Scranton Prep).Two days later, they had to take a bus to Tamaqua and never skipped a beat in torching the feisty Blue Raiders, 65-22.It's not like Pottsville was climbing a 100-foot wall, mind you, but this team plays end-to-end, quarter after quarter, and dictates everything at the defensive end. Pottsville is so agitating without the ball it would test the patience of Job."We want to emphasize our man-to-man defense, and I thought our kids did a really good job of that consistently," said head coach Dave Mullaney. "Understandably, they were missing a couple of their key players."True, but no matter who was on the court, Pottsville dictated the tempo and used a balanced attack on the offensive side. They did all that while also using four quality players off the benchMullaney never hesitated to insert fresh troops, even four minutes into the contest, while his team gushed to a 17-4 lead after eight minutes."They're intimidating alright," said Tamaqua coach Jim Barron, whose team fell to 8-6 overall, 2-5 in Division 1 of the Schuylkill Boys' Basketball League. "You could tell just one minute into the game. We missed a few easy shots, and yes we didn't have two starters (Thad Zuber and Zeke Wassell), so we mainly had some freshmen and sophomores on the floor."Certainly Mullaney treats his opposition with respect. He deadpanned that at one point. "We don't take anyone for granted. We play hard; our coaches do a good job of getting our kids ready."And there were plenty of points to spread around the lineup. Jordan Abdo drained 18 after a super outing against Prep with 31 points.Freshman sharpshooter Mason Barnes tossed in 12, including three treys. They were the only double-digit scorers for the winners."We turned it over way too many times, especially in the first half," said Barron. "But they caused most of those."Tamaqua also couldn't find the handle, committing 15 miscues in the first half before adjusting to the speed of the game.Pottsville (8-3, 6-1 D-I SIAL) rolled to a 40-13 halftime lead, and expanded the margin to 58-19 before junior Tyler Timberlake hit a scoop shot for a 60-19 score to open the final quarter and invoke the Mercy Rule."They're just an exceptional team," praised Barron. "We'll be alright. We learned from this. We just have to put it behind us and go forward."NOT ALL GLOOM ... There were some bright spots for the Raiders, including Josh Inama's four blocked shots on 6-7 Ian Renninger, a Division I recruit. Plaudits also go to Gabe Gregoire with his inside play.FUNNY STAT ... Statistics can be deceiving. Case in point would be the rebounding - both teams had 24 apiece. Inama had seven and Gregoire, who led his team in scoring with nine points, had four. Alex Pellish and Renninger both had five rebounds for the Tide.JV'S DROPPED ... Pottsville claimed the opener 65-32.POTTSVILLEBarnes 4-1-2-12, Timberlake 2-1-2-5, Wood 4-0-0-9, Melochick 2-0-0-5, Hahner 1-0-0-2, Pellish 3-0-0-6, Abdo 6-3-3-18, Renninger 1-3-3-5, Kendrick, 1-0-0-3, Stanton 0-0-0-0. TOTALS: 24-8-10-65.TAMAQUABonetsky 0-0-0-0, Stianche 0-0-0-0, Kurek 0-0-0-0, Knoblauch 0-2-2-2, Scott 4-0-0-8, Rother 0-0-0-0, Inama 1-0-0-2, G, Gregoire 3-3-3-9, L. Gregoire 0-1-2-1, Griffin 0-0-0-0. TOTALS: 8-6-7-22.Pottsville 17 23 18 7 - 65Tamaqua 4 9 6 3 - 22Three-pointers: Pottsville - Barnes 3, Abdo 3, Melochick 1, Wood 1, Kendrick 1; Tamaqua - None.