1986: An Unbelievable Run to a 'Ship
Hardly anyone saw this one coming—the stunning, first-ever boys’ basketball state championship for Conval High in the 1985-’86 season.
A young team with just two seniors—co-captains Chris Merrifield and Sean Crowley—the Cougars began the season stumbling at 1-4 and trying to find their bearings. The inauspicious beginning was marked by the first-ever loss by a Conval team at Kearsarge, and home games in cold December and early January played before sparse crowds.
But something clicked during a January home loss to powerful Fall Mountain. Turnovers diminished, the offense became more cohesive, and the defense ramped up with tremendous intensity. Suddenly, the team few had noticed reeled off nine wins in its final 10 games to finish the season in fifth place with a 12-6 record. Quiet confidence building among players and coaches prompted head coach Art Giovannangeli to go out on a limb heading into the Class I (D2) tournament:
“I think we have a real good shot at winning the whole thing. There aren’t any real overpowering teams in Class I this season. If we play well and maybe get one or two kids on a hot streak, we can go all the way.”
Call it bold, or better yet, call it a coach who knew his team.
Despite getting out of the gate ice-cold in a preliminary round game against 12th-ranked Kearsarge, Conval put their early-season setback to bed with a solid 72-57 victory. Against fourth-ranked Lebanon in the quarter-finals, the Cougars played strong defense and kept the Raiders’ leading scorer, Mike Joslin, at bay, building a surprising nine-point lead with just 2:10 left in the contest. Near-disaster struck, however, as Lebanon put on a furious rally and had UNH’s Lundholm Gym in a frenzy by whittling the deficit to three with less than minute to go...
But then, a recurring theme throughout the '85-'86 tournament:
Foul these Cougars at your own risk.
Hunter Burgess, Al Johnson and Don Douzanis combined for six free throws in the final seconds—the Cougars went 17 for 22 for the game!—holding on for a pulsating 53-48 victory.
In the semi-finals against Berlin, which had upset top-ranked Timberlane with a methodical offense and tough defense, Conval again began strong, building a commanding 26-14 lead heading into the final quarter. The Cougars’ pressure defense had held Berlin to single-digit scoring in each quarter before it, once again, nearly unraveled in the final seconds. The Mountaineers suddenly found their shooting touch and somehow rallied back to take a 32-30 lead with just 34 seconds to go.
It is here when Al Johnson took over, scoring a clutch three-pointer with 13 seconds left, and then putting his name in the Guinness Book of World Records by scoring six points in the game’s final seconds—two on technical free throws and four on layups—to propel Conval to a 38-32 slugfest win and a berth in the championship game against old nemesis Fall Mountain.
The heavily-favored Wildcats, who had handled Conval twice during the regular season, showed no signs of letting up. After a tensely-fought first half where Conval’s zone defensive pressure kept Fall Mountain’s shooting guards uncomfortable, the Wildcats quickly turned a 22-18 halftime deficit into a sizable lead with a strong third quarter.
With less than six minutes to go in the game, it was beginning to look like the impossible dream and run out of magic as Fall Mountain built a 39-34 lead—a comparatively huge deficit in a game that was a rock fight. But then there was this, as reported by Mike Dickerman of the Peterborough Transcript:
“Al Johnson ignited what is surely the best six minutes of basketball ever played by a Conval team when he scored on a short jump shot. He would only score eight point in the game, but none was ever as important. Captain Crowley was next in line and his twisting move in the paint closed the gap to 39-38. With 3:50 remaining and the intensity in the UNH gym reaching a fever pitch, Johnson put the Cougars out in front when he canned two free throws.”
In the final chaotic seconds, the two teams traded baskets, and Fall Mountain pulled even at 43 with 1:43 on the clock.
A championship was won, however, the same way the other games had been decided—dead-eye accuracy at the foul line, even with thousands screaming on every shot attempt.
A dramatic layup by Merrifield on a precision bounce pass from Clint Burgess gave Conval a 48-44 lead, and with the Wildcats forced to foul, the Cougars went to their strength. Clint Burgess scored twice from the foul line with 40 seconds to go, and then sealed the improbable 52-48 championship win with two more free throws with 18 seconds left.
Joyful chaos on the floor and in the stands at the buzzer. A long and joyful caravan back home, and more celebrating the unbelievable season at a reception in The Cave that lasted beyond midnight.
No one saw it coming back in the 1-4 days of December. Except maybe Coach Giovannengeli. Except maybe the players.
“At the beginning of the year,” said Coach Gio, “I really thought we had a talented team which had a shot at winning it all. The kids worked hard all season, especially on defense. We were giving up 75 points game in the beginning and now we’re down to 58 points or something like that. I’ve had better teams here, but they’ve never come around like this one.”
The pressure, after all, was on everyone else. “All year, we worked together as a team,” said co-captain Crowley. “Mr. Gio had a lot of confidence in us by the time we got into the tournament, and he told us he thought we had a good chance to win it all. Coming into the final game, we didn’t have any pressure on us at all. They (Fall Mountain) were the team that was supposed to win it all.”
And like Lebanon, Berlin and Kearsarge before them, they learned the hard way—foul these Cougars at your own risk.
The 1985-'86 state champs pictured above (front, from left): Ron MacNutt, Don Douzanis, Eric Miller, Hunter Burgess and Scott Miller. Second row: Coach Art Giovannangeli, Cary Vose, Sean Crowley, Bill Ray and Aaron Kullgren. Back row: Chris Merrifield, Al Johnson, Clint Burgess and Brian Thompson.
