SHORT GAP, W.Va. — Mountain Ridge led by 20 points midway through the third quarter, but Frankfort rallied to get within six points late in the fourth.
Despite 38 points from Jeremy Phillips, including 22 after halftime, the Miners (1-0) held on for a 78-72 win on Tuesday.
"It was a good opening night," Mountain Ridge head coach Tim Nightengale said. "We played a good game, Phillips is a real nice player. He's tough to hold down, he got a lot of points tonight. Our focus was on him, but he got loose and started to hit some shots."
Leading 38-31 at halftime, Mountain Ridge opened the second half on a 17-4 run.
Levi Clise recorded a steal, then set up AJ Lauder for a 3-pointer to stretch the Miner lead to 55-35 with four minutes left in the third.
Phillips scored nine points to end the quarter and cut the Falcons' deficit to 59-47.
"We just can't get down like we did in the first half," Frankfort head coach Scott Slider said. "Didn't do what we needed to do off the bat."
Led by Phillips and Kycin Waites, Frankfort (0-1) went on a 19-13 run to get within six points with 1:24 to play.
Phillips had 16 points at halftime before adding 11 points in each of the final two frames.
"We weren't executing what our game plan was," Slider said. "We weren't moving the basketball. I think his drives to the bucket allowed him to get to the foul line, which allowed him to hit some shots there. It gave him some confidence."
Waites scored 17 points with nine in the final stanza along with three steals.
"We had them up by 20 points, then we start taking some poor shots," Nightengale said. "We wanted to get the ball to the basket. We were taking 3-pointers, we were up 18 and took four threes."
Leading 72-66, the Miners stretched their lead to eight on a layup by John Delaney assisted by Clise.
Clise scored five points with seven assists, a steal and a block.
Waites hit a pair of layups in the final minute, but free throws from Lauder and Kris Washington iced the game.
Washington finished with 17 points.
Delaney got off to a fast start in the first half with 15 points.
Leading 9-7 early, Delaney scored five points with a steal to extend Mountain Ridge's lead to 23-14 after one.
Delaney finished with 26 points, four assists and two steals.
"John's just a smart player, he runs our offense, he sees the floor well," Nightengale said. "Gets other players involved. He did a nice job and his shot was falling tonight. He was able to come off screens and get into space and hit his jumpers."
The Falcons got within four points in the second quarter on a Phillips pull-up, but the Miners ended the half on a 12-9 run.
"Our defense was not very aggressive in the first half," Slider said. "We allowed them to do a lot of stuff that we should've been better at defending. We defended better in the fourth quarter, but not as strong as we needed to."
Braeden Laffey added 10 points with a steal for Frankfort.
Mountain Ridge hosts Tucker County on Friday at 7:30 p.m.
"Tucker County always has athletes, they're gonna play hard, they're gonna play aggressive," Nightengale said. "It's gonna be a battle, but it's at Mountain Ridge and we're excited about that."
Frankfort heads to East Fairmont on Saturday at 5 p.m.
"It reminds me of Petersburg, Allegany, there were about four games last year where we did exactly that," Slider said of waiting too late to rally. "We waited until the fourth quarter. I think the Petersburg game, we waited until four minutes to go before they decided to battle back."
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