Warriors hang 107 on James Wood

January 7, 2012
By KEVIN TRUDGEON


STEPHENS CITY- There may be no greater motivation for a group of boys than a challenge from their female counterparts.

After watching its girls' basketball team reach 100 points in the game before, the Sherando boys' basketball team answered the bell with a 107-93 win over visiting James Wood Friday evening.

The Warriors had yet to even break 90 through 11 games this season, but facing the high-scoring Colonels they found their offensive stride, thanks in part to the game that was played before them.

"When [the girls] came off the court after their game, they told us that they'd scored 100 and now we had to," said Sherando senior guard Brady Cook with a smile, referring to the girls' team's 100-68 win. "We had to beat them."

They did so with one of their highest scoring outputs under coach Garland Williams, scoring 50 points in the first half and 57 in the second half.

James Wood (5-6, 0-1 Northwestern District) came into the game as the team with penchant for scoring in bunches, but it was Sherando (5-7, 1-0) that seemed to have the offensive firepower from the start. Even with senior center Terry Wood hobbled with an ankle injury in the first half, the Warriors jumped out to 28-18 lead in the first quarter and used a 9-1 run midway through the second quarter to ensure they held a six-point lead heading into halftime.

"That wasn't the game plan," said Williams when asked about his team's willingness to run with the Colonels, who deployed a full-court press from the opening tip.

"We were looking to work it into our big guy, but he tweaked his ankle a little bit and couldn't go full tilt in the first half. We wanted to run our sets, but we knew their trap was coming and our guys were just doing a good job of find the opening and hitting the right man."

Two of those men were Cook (career high 32 points) and junior guard Aaron Miller (20 points), who combined for 52 points in the game and helped carry the scoring load for Sherando in the first half.

Wood returned to the court to start the third quarter and immediately scored and was fouled on the opening possession for his first points of the game.

Although visibly hurting, the 6-foot-8 senior managed to gut it out and score all 16 of his points over the final two quarters.

"I've got to give him a lot of credit because he was hurting pretty bad," Williams said. "But our trainer taped him up and got him going and he was able to give us something, which was big."

That's because despite never leading in the second half, James Wood simply would not go away.

With coach Al Smith utilizing a hockey-like substitution pattern that saw five Colonels enter and exit the game every few minutes, James Wood stayed within striking distance thanks to 12 3-pointers.

A 9-0 run in the span of 32 seconds early in the second quarter showed just how potent the Colonels' offense could be and sophomore guard Camden Butler (19 points, five 3-pointers) and junior Michael Carter (19 points) helped keep the deficit in single digits for much of the second half.

"They pace was exactly what we wanted," Smith said. "I'm happy with our effort tonight, but we need to tweak some things and work on our rotations.

"We struggled a little bit shooting wise, but I think what it really comes down to is we needed to do a little bit better job trapping the basketball and creating turnovers."

Up 79-73 heading into the fourth quarter, Sherando went on a 12-5 run behind back-to-back 3-pointers from Cook and three straight layups after breaking James Wood's press.

Butler would hit a 3-pointer to stop the run and cut the deficit to 10, but Cook found junior forward John Harrell alone under the basket on Sherando's very next possession for an easy score.

"We just kept answering them, they did a great job scoring, but we did a good job matching everything they did," Cook said.

Williams said it may not have gone the way he had planned it, but he'll take the win any day.

"We were hoping to keep it in the 50's and get a win," Williams said. "But we knew with this group, playing them, that they were going to come after us. Our thing was to focus on limiting turnovers and I thought we did a good job of that.

"There were a couple shots that went up where, to tell you the truth, I was yelling, "No, no, no...OK!" But our shooters were in rhythm and they took the shots and made them."

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