Fairview (Boulder, Colo.) took an important step toward locking up the Class 5A Front Range League title last week with a 68-49 road win at Mountain Range (Westminster, Colo.).
Yet, routing the third-place team in the league might not have been as telling as the way the Knights did it. Fairview played the first half almost entirely without leading scorer Darragh O'Neill. O’Neill collected two offensive fouls inside of the first two minutes and didn’t get back on the court until the third quarter. He averages nearly 25 points per game, tops in 5A, so that was a significant hole to fill.
Michael Melillo, though, continued his excellent play by scoring 19 points. Fairview coach Frank Lee still got a big contribution from the O’Neill family when Darragh’s junior brother Shane dropped in 18 points, just below his season high.
“It was really tough at first,” Darragh said. “When they locked me down like that, I had to cheer from the bench. But Shane and Melillo actually made it fun to watch.”
Mountain Range, which had a nine-game win streak not long ago, dropped its third consecutive game. The Mustangs were led by Mitch Castillo, who scored 19 points.
The Knights played a challenging nonleague schedule and can close out an undefeated Front Range record by beating Legacy on Tuesday and at Loveland on Friday. Fairview entered the week with a 16-5 overall record, 9-0 in the Front Range League.
Melillo can be a little streaky with his outside shooting, and Darragh O’Neill gets most of his points inside and deadly with free throws. Lee said the 6-foot-4 junior has been in physically healthier during this surge.
Darragh, who draws plenty of able defensive players, including Mountain Range’s Edgar Crockett, is thrilled to have Melillo back in form.
“When he starts feeling it, he plays really well,” O’Neill said. “To have him playing like this, it helps me a ton.”
Darragh’s recovery
Darragh O’Neill became known for basketball perhaps only last season, but that’s because he missed much of his sophomore year. In fact, he nearly missed out on the rest of his life.
He had a lung disease, needed a Flight for Life helicopter ride and was out of commission for seven months. Darragh’s lungs hemorraghed, he was in a coma and needed a surgical procedure on the veins to his heart.
After that, he needed to inject himself with blood thinners two or three times per day. Known for his pace and stamina developed in soccer, Darrah wasn’t able to run at all.
“My lungs were just completely killed after that,” he said. “I lost 25 pounds.”
Darragh counts himself lucky for still being able to play two sports and Fairview’s success has been enlarged from his defensive skills, especially stealing the ball. This season, he has twice broken the 40-point barrier.
Melillo’s biggest fan
Sure, he led the Knights in scoring against the Mustangs and drilled four three-pointers. That’s not all that impressed the crowd at Mountain Range last Friday, two days before Valentine’s Day.
In fact, one fan was so enthralled that she waited outside the Knights’ locker room and asked around for Melillo’s phone number. When some Fairview players emerged, she asked if her heartthrob had a girlfriend. Unfortunately, she was disappointed in that regard.
Bracket meeting
Roderick Taylor, Montbello
Photo by Patrick Miller
Final week preview
In Class 4A, the Northern League has some big games this week at its postseason tournament. Sterling (Sterling, Colo.) avenged its lone loss to Berthoud (Berthoud, Colo.) with a 69-60 win on Jan. 29. The Tigers faced Greeley Central (Greeley, Colo.) on Tuesday. Northridge (Greeley, Colo.), which has had a good season, lost to Greeley Central 91-73 on Saturday. Longmont (Longmont, Colo.) and Broomfield (Broomfield, Colo.), the two other top Northern teams also played on Tuesday. The tournament concludes at 7:30 p.m. Friday with the championship at Butler-Hancock Hall on the University of Northern Colorado campus in Greeley.
In Class 5A, the picture cleared a bit in the Denver Prep League after Montbello (Denver, Colo.) edged Denver East (Denver, Colo.) 61-60. While the game does attract notice for being a matchup between the son-father combination of Montbello’s David Carey and East’s Rudy Carey, it also kept the Warriors atop the league race.
Montbello played tough Thomas Jefferson on Tuesday and then concludes the regular season against Denver South. East has a more difficult finale, against Lincoln which had only on league loss, just like the Angels.
