He was correct, as the host and fourth-seeded Cardinals downed the fifth-seeded Bulldogs, 50-41, in the teams’ third meeting of the season.

“We had the picture of the final score posted in our locker room, 75-46, all week,” said Bruno, who finished with 10 points and was one of four Cardinals in double-figure scoring. “We had to look at that every day these past few days. It was in our lockers all week. It was up on our scoreboard all week during practices. We were extremely motivated. We wanted this one bad.

“We watched film and we knew what we had to do. We just had to do it. We got better after that and we executed what coach wanted us to. We played hard, played unselfish, got the lead and we were able to hang on. This is a huge win. A lot of people were doubting us, but we know what we can do.”

Canfield will play top-seeded Chaney in a district semifinal at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Boardman.

Staff photo / Brad Emerine Canfield’s Trey Dye, looks to make a move on Poland’s Michael Gordon during the Cardinals’ 50-41 home win in a Division II sectional bracket final on Friday night.

The win over their rivals at home was also a motivating factor for Canfield’s five seniors.

“(Coach Todd Muckleroy) told us seniors before the game that we get to write our ending right now,” Bruno said. “That was for tonight, our final home game, and that was for the tournament. If you didn’t like the way things went this year, go out and write a better ending to the season.

“One way to do that was get a win tonight and make a tournament run. When we play our best, I think we can beat anybody in this district. That’s the great part about the playoffs. Every starts even at 0-0. We’ve got our energy up and we want to make a run.”

The Bulldogs entered the sectional bracket final having won seven in a row and 8 of 9 entering since losing to Canfield 35-33 on Jan. 11.

Poland, which finished 17-7, trailed 11-10 after the first period and 20-18 at halftime before Canfield used an 11-4 third-quarter scoring advantage to assume a 31-22 lead. Bruno hit a pair of 3-pointers in the third period and Trent Dye had another.

Staff photo / Brad Emerine Poland’s Michael Cougras drives the baseline against the Canfield trio of Trent Dye, left, Joe Bruno, center, and Jake Kowal during a Division II sectional bracket final on Friday night. The host Cardinals won 50-41.

The Cardinals had an 18-0 scoring advantage from 3-point land entering the fourth period.

“We knew coming in that we had to attack the basket because we really hurt them last Friday with 12 3s and we figured they were going to take away those perimeter looks,” Poland coach Ken Grisdale said. “But we didn’t do a good job finishing in the paint.We had a lot of opportunities at the basket tonight that we just didn’t finish. We were getting into the paint on a lot of occasions and we just missed.

“They let us play a physical game without much being called until we had to foul at the end. We’re not big to begin with, so those bumps threw us off. But we didn’t adjust offensively to the way the game was being called. It’s part of the game and you have to find a way to finish through contact.”

Poland thought it had the opportunities to have the halftime lead.

“Our defensive rebounding really hurt us, especially in the first half,” Grisdale said. “We forced them to take some bad shots, we’ve got three guys under the basket and they have one under there and they’re getting a decent number of offensive rebounds. So our shortcomings were not finishing shots at the basket and not finishing the rebounding job by corralling the ball.

“It was really important for us to be able to get on the lead early and then we’d be able to dictate the tempo we wanted. But if you don’t finish in those two categories, your chances of winning are awfully slim.”

Zach Kassem connected on Poland’s first 3-pointer of the contest to open the fourth period, but Dye responded with a 3-pointer for Canfield and Chase Lowry scored on a drive. Adam Kassem’s 3-ball pulled Poland within 38-29, but the Bulldogs never got closer than 43-36 with 1:25 remaining.

Brayden Beck had a game-high 16 points to pace Canfield. Dye finished with 11 and Lowry and Bruno added 10 apiece.

“I think our coaching staff did a great job preparing our guys for what (Poland was) going to do,” Muckleroy said. “We made little tweaks here and there and we didn’t overcoach and change everything based on our last game against them. Our players did a great job of executing our game plan. I’m proud of them. We made some shots that we didn’t make in the last meeting.

“We wanted to get a little bit of a lead and then rely on our defense and make (Poland) defend for long stretches. I thought our defense was very strong. (Poland) wanted to take some quicker shots in their offense in the final four minutes, but they couldn’t because we were applying heavy defense. We made them take forced 2s. It’s not a complicated game. If you’re not making shots, you better be able to defend and that’s the style we wanted to play tonight.

Adam Kassem led Poland with 12 points and Michael Gordon added 10.