The Northeast Nodaway boys avenged a loss to Stewartsville as they turned around and beat them 63-49 Friday night in a Platte Valley Conference matchup. Northeast's boys won their sixth game of the year to even their record at 6-6.
Sage DeLong scored five quick points in the first 51 seconds of the game for Northeast. That opened up everything else for Northeast even though he only scored two more points for the rest of the game. It also forced Stewartsville to come out and guard him and opened up scoring chances for everyone else.
Coach Chaim Jenkins said that the reason Northeast won this time was because they did a much better job of playing as a team. They have gotten to the point where all five players are a threat to score at any time.
Stewartsville came back to take a 7-5 lead, but then Garet Jackson hit a 3-pointer and then Aaron Patton (19 points) scored off consecutive steals and a putback to put Northeast up for good at 14-7. Joel Scroggie then converted a 3-point play to put Northeast up 17-8 after one quarter of play.
Joel Scroggie (17 points) had a career high for the night; he had the hot hand in the second quarter and everyone was feeding him the ball in the first four minutes of that frame. Steve Schulte (7 points) even passed up a wide-open three-pointer with nobody within 10 feet of him so he could feed Joel down low for an easy basket. Northeast was getting the ball into Kevin Stoll (4 points); the Cardinals would collapse on him and he would feed Joel on the other side for some easy baskets. Aaron Patton hit a couple of free throws and scored off a steal; Steve Schulte got loose in the open court and scored off a spin move as Northeast led 35-14 with 1:13 left in the first half. Northeast's biggest lead was 39-14 as Patton scored off a steal with 20 seconds left for Northeast.
But that was not a safe lead for an explosive team like Stewartsville, which lives and dies off the 3-pointer. The Cardinals hit three in the third period; Kevin Stoll picked up his third foul in the period and came out early; despite the fact that he only had four points, his energy and effort on both sides of the ball was badly missed. The Cardinals came back to as close as 49-32 before Patton's drive with 19 seconds left put Northeast up 51-32.
Kevin Stoll came back in for the fourth and scored four quick points as Northeast went back in front by 21 at 57-36. Stewartsville then went to their half court trapping zone. It was not a typical half-court trap where you try to trap when the ball crosses half court; they would set up in a normal zone defense and then funnel the ball to the sidelines for a trap. The object is the same as conventional trapping defenses, to speed up the other team into making mistakes. Northeast played into their hands for a stretch, allowing Stewartsville to get back to within 15 at 59-44, but then they settled down and Joel Scroggie hit an inside shot and Aaron Patton scored off a drive and scoop shot to push it back up to 19 before both teams went to their JV squads. Stewartsville came back to within 14 in garbage time action.
No comments:
Post a Comment