Despite Westfield’s recent domination, the matchup remains one of Chautauqua County’s underrated rivalries.

The teams’ battle Friday at Chautauqua Lake lived up to the hype.

Swanson poured in 31 points — in the process tying Fredonia graduate Michael Heary for second place on the county’s all-time scoring list with 2,235 points — as the Wolverines rallied from a halftime deficit to beat the Eagles 68-57 in front of a raucous, filled gymnasium in Mayville.

“Ever since I took over last year, anytime we play Westfield, the school is on board, the community is talking about coming out to games,” Chautauqua Lake head coach Devin Pope said. “It’s been a rivalry since I was in school, but now it’s a little more amped up.”

Chautauqua Lake’s Nick Jacobson surveys the floor against Westfield in CCAA D2 action on Friday. P-J photo by Jason Bower

Chautauqua Lake (10-8, 8-4) led 20-15 after the first quarter and 29-28 at halftime before a back-and-forth third quarter that featured eight lead changes saw Westfield (16-2, 9-1) leave with a 44-43 lead.

“They got in and got to the rim. We struggled to help,” Westfield head coach Nolan Swanson said. ” … They did a good job of getting by their defender and the help wasn’t very good today.”

Then it was time for Swanson and Zach Maguire to close out the game. Swanson scored the first bucket of the fourth quarter to make it a three-point game and then, after Chautauqua Lake’s Nick Jacobson scored on a drive, Maguire hit a 3-pointer to make it 49-45 with 6:43 remaining.

“Zach is such a capable shooter and big man. When my other shooters aren’t hitting, I obviously need more points out of Carson and him,” Nolan Swanson said. “We didn’t get much shooting today outside of those guys.”

Swanson then scored the next 10 points for the Wolverines before Maguire scored in the lane and then hit a 3-pointer to give Westfield a 64-56 lead with 43 seconds remaining.

“I’m proud of my guys. A 2,000-point scorer comes in and has 31, but he didn’t kill us the entire game,” Pope said. “They always have somebody step up. We always want someone other than Carson to beat us. Tonight it just happened to be Maguire.”

“He’s one of the most unbelievable shooters,” Nolan Swanson said of Maguire. “If you saw practice, it’s a crazy-high percentage. It’s starting to translate into games.”

The Eagles turned the ball over on their next trip before Swanson and Maguire closed out the game at the free-throw line, going a combined 4 of 6 from the line after Maguire hit two bonus foul shots following a technical.

“Everybody is slowing it down against us. They don’t play this defense against anybody else. … They are guarding us with three people at half-court. It slows the game down and makes things methodical,” said Nolan Swanson, whose team attempted just 46 shots in the game. “They got the ball and ran 25 (seconds) off. They were not wanting to shoot the ball themselves. Possessions were limited.”

Despite the loss, Pope was proud of the way his team played heading into the postseason. The Eagles are currently the No. 9 seed in Class C for the Section VI playoffs.

“The last four times we’ve played them, we’ve been up at halftime. … We knew it was going to take a full team effort in the second half, the ball just didn’t go in,” Pope said. “I don’t think there was a seat open in the house tonight. It was awesome to see, that’s the stuff we love. The boys feed off the energy.”

NOTES: Swanson had 10 rebounds, seven assists and seven rebounds, while Maguire had 22 points, nine rebounds, four blocked shots and three assists for Westfield, which shot 21 of 46 from the field, including 7 of 21 from 3-point range, and turned the ball over 14 times. … Jacobson had 22 points, eight assists and four rebounds; Nate Henry had 10 points and five steals; and Brendan Klossner had eight rebounds, three assists and two steals for Chautauqua Lake, which shot 20 of 40 from the field, including 4 of 21 from 3-point range, and turned the ball over 12 times.

WESTFIELD (68)

Paddock 2 0 5, BSwanson 1 1 3, Whitesell 0 0 0, Maguire 6 8 22, CSwanson 9 10 31, Thomas 1 0 3, Anderson 1 0 2, Beadle 1 0 2. Totals 21 19 68.

CHAUTAUQUA LAKE (57)

Jacobson 7 6 22, Henry 3 3 10, Fairbank 0 0 0, Swan 0 0 0, YAbuhmedian 3 3 9, Klossner 3 0 7, Houser 4 1 9. Totals 20 13 57.

3-point goals–Paddock, Maguire 2, CSwanson 3, Thomas, Jacobson 2, Henry, Klossner.

Westfield 15 13 16 24 — 68

Chautauqua Lake 20 9 14 14 — 57