Marian seemed a bit frazzled early Tuesday evening against Tri-Valley.

The Colts were doing everything fundamentally sound, save for one important thing: They couldn't put the ball in the ocean, especially from the paint.But a new dawning arrived in the second half, when John Woitko took things into his own hands. The 5-10 senior guard fired his team up with a sensational 25-points, enabling the Colts to rally past the visiting Bulldogs for an impressive 69-50 victory.Woitko, like his teammates, wasn't stroking the ball all that well at the start, but once he found his range, he was impressive."I just needed to regain my confidence," said Woitko.Oh brother, did he find his confidence. He scored all of three points in the first half then proceeded to knock down three's as if he were in a shooting gallery going 6-for-9 from the arc and 9-of-16 overall on the evening from the floor."That was huge for us," said Marian head coach John Patton, as he watched his team even their seasonal and league records at 6-6 and 3-3 in Division III of the Schuylkill Boys' Basketball League."Yeah we had our (shooting) moments in the first half. But we became a lot more aggressive (defensively). We had to get better protecting the ball, and it was a matter of us shooting better."Tri-Valley rode the blistering hands of 6-2 Jaden Buchanan and Bryce McNally the better part of the night. For that duo combined for 36 of their team's points, with Buchanan taking honors with 23 and the latter dumping in 13."He is such a good athlete, we had troubles keeping him in check," mentioned Patton of Buchanan.Trailing 30-27 to open the third chapter, Marian went bonkers. The Colts opened with 5-0 run thanks to Josh Inama (13), for a short-lived 33-30 lead. McNally countered with a tying triple, then the Colts started to stoke the fires.Ethan Kuczynski (13) drained a triple, Woitko put up a trey of his own, Aaron DeAngelo sank a bucket and hit a foul conversion before Woitko added three more points off a steal and a foul shot.Suddenly the Colts were in command, 45-35. And when Woitko hit two more trey's the Colts were gunning a 9-for-12 from the field and before the buzzer sounded Jake Paluck beat the clock with a jumper. That pushed Marian in front 57-42 and it was ready to coast home without further troubles."We had some bad offensive possessions in the first half," said Patton. "They got some easy baskets (in the first half) and I think we settled that down much better in the second half. The thing that turned it around was the way we came out to start the second half."Plus we went to a screen at the top of that three-two (zone) in the second half and that gave us a lot of good looks inside. And when they collapsed that opened it up for (Woitko) to shoot the ball, and Inama is a real warrior he banged the boards for us… we needed that."HOT SHOTS … The Colts were sizzling in the third quarter shooting 8-for-11 to start and went 12-of-18 in the eight minute session. Marian finished 26-for-58 from the floor.GLASS CLEANERS … Marian outrebounded the 'Dawgs 34-24. Inama had 12, giving him a double-double on the contest. DeAngelo picked off nine retrieves and nine points.JV SWEEP … The Colts were winners in the opener 63-33 led by Ian Myers who scored 13 and Gabe Miller with eight.START TIME SATURDAY … Marian hosts Lincoln Leadership with a JV contest starting at 12:30 p.m.TRI-VALLEYJ. Buchanan 9-4-4-23, McNally 5-0-0-13, Yoder 1-2-4-4, N. Ziegmont 2-0-2-5, J. Ziegmont 2-0-0-5, A. Buchanan 0-0-0-0, Opozda 0-0-1-0. Totals 19-6-11-50.MARIANWoitko 9-1-1-25, Inama 5-3-13-13, Kuczynski 5-2-2-13, DeAngelo 4-1-1-9, Paisley 2-0-0-5, Paluck -0-0-2, Puzza 0-2-2-2, Lentz 0-0-0-0, J. Miller 0-0-0-0, Maylath 0-0-0-0, Karchner 0-0-0-0, Cortese 0-0-0-0, Mummey 0-0-0-0, Mohammed 0-0-0-0, Myers 0-0-0-0, Collevicho 0-0-0-0. G. Miller 0-0-0-0. Totals 26-9-21-69.Tri-Valley 14 16 12 8 - 50Marian 14 13 28 14 - 69Three-pointers: Tri-Valley - McNalley 3, J. Buchanan 1, N. Ziegmont 1, J. Ziegmont 1; Marian - Woitko 6, Kuczynski 1, Paisley 1.