Blake Weslin sparks Green Mountain in win over Golden

LAKEWOOD — Green Mountain junior Blake Weslin had a memorable 64 seconds to close out the first quarter Friday night.

Weslin scored 12 points over the final 64 seconds to close out the first quarter in the Rams’ eventual 75-51 home victory over rival Golden.

“My teammates were finding me the ball and we were getting stops on defense,” Weslin said of his dozen points in a little over a minute. “We were getting buckets in transition and getting open looks. I just shoot my shot and they fell.”

The junior guard had a driving layup and was fouled to make a make a 3-point play the hard way to start the remarkable run with 1:04 left in the quarter. Weslin then drained a 3-pointer with 32 seconds left. He made another 3-pointer with 1.9 seconds left and was fouled to complete a rare 4-point play.

“It’s not a surprise. We’ve seen that over-and-over,” Green Mountain coach Mike Puccio said of Weslin getting hot offensively and finishing with a game-high 28 points despite not playing in the fourth quarter. “With multi-sport guys sometimes it takes awhile to get going. I’m proud of him. He is a dog and has something to him. It’s great to see him have that success in a big moment.”

Weslin was on Green Mountain’s football team that advanced to the Class 3A state semifinals this past Fall season.

Golden turned the ball over with .5 seconds left. An inbound pass from senior Benson Wachter was perfect to Weslin who tipped the ball in at the buzzer to finish off the run and give Green Mountain a 23-9 lead heading into the second quarter.

“To be fair we have that play. Benson threw an unbelievable pass,” Puccio said of the play at the buzzer. “As soon as Benson let it go I knew we would have a shot at it. It was a great paired effort. It was awesome.”

Green Mountain (6-5, 1-0 in league) held at least a 20-point lead for the majority of the second half. Wachter pitched in 15 points. Junior Austin Beeson and sophomore Simon Landsford both had 7 points each as 10 different Rams scored in the Class 5A/4A Jeffco League opening win.

“We’ve told them that this isn’t a normal league deal,” Puccio said of just playing everyone once in the 11-team conference this season. “If we want to hang (league banner) we can’t slip up any night.”

Golden (3-8, 0-1) was led by juniors Slade Pike (15 points) and Alex Erger (10 points). However, a poor first-half shooting performance dug too much of a hole for Golden to dig out of.

“I think what hurt us is we weren’t hitting shots and they were hitting everything,” Golden coach Lou Vullo said. “At halftime we were 1-for-16 and they were 5-for-9 on 3-pointers. That really hurt us.”

Golden finished 7-for-30 from 3-point range, while Green Mountain was 10-for-20 from long distance.

Green Mountain hits the road the middle of next week. The Rams travel to Conifer on Wednesday, Jan. 11, to face the Lobos (3-6).

“It’s a good mindset,” Weslin said as conference play gets going. “We just have to keep building our team. Get people more confidence.”

It doesn’t get any easier for Golden. The Demons host Dakota Ridge next Wednesday. The Eagles (8-2, 1-0) are No. 6 in the current CHSAANow.com Class 5A rankings. Dakota Ridge won its league opener over Alameda International on Friday night in a big way. The final was 125-23.

“It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. It is what we believe in the room,” Vullo said after the Demons’ 3-8 start to the season. “I know what we have and the kids play super hard for us. Our non-conference schedule didn’t do us any favors and we play the two toughest teams in the league right after Winter Break.”