Two late runs fuel Millbrook boys' victory

By JERRY HOLSWORTH | Special to The Winchester Star

WINCHESTER — Two late runs by the Millbrook boys’ basketball team, one at the end of the first half, and the other at the end of the third quarter spelled doom for James Wood in a Northwestern District contest Tuesday.

The Pioneers outscored the Colonels a combined 12-0 in those two spurts which fueled a 52-35 triumph

“Basketball is a game of runs,” said Pioneer coach Ben Bates, whose team improved to 10-9 overall, 3-4 in the district. “And we got a couple of good ones to end the half and the third quarter. I think we’re getting there as a team. It’s still a work in progress, and we really don’t want to be at 100 percent right now. We’re hoping that we can improve some more over the last week and a half of the season.”

James Wood led 12-9 after one quarter and was down 19-18 with 45 seconds left in the first half when the Pioneers surged. Millbrook’s Jordan Jackson scored three points and Conner Freeman chipped in another bucket to give the Pioneers a 24-18 lead at halftime.

It was a stunning way to end a half where Wood had controlled play and led through most of the first 16 minutes of play.

It was nothing compared to Noah Thomas’ heroics to end the third quarter.

Millbrook held the lead throughout the third period, but the Colonels were keeping the pressure on, and with 1:55 left in the quarter Ben Sear nailed a pair of free throws to narrow the Pioneers lead to 32-26.

Thomas took control from there with two consecutive 3-pointers to lead Millbrook on a 7-0 run which expanded the lead to 39-26 heading into the final quarter.

“Cam (Funk) was covered and so they fed me the ball and I was able to hit it,” Thomas said. “I got another one just a few seconds later. That was really exciting and fun. Wood is a physical team and it was difficult to get good shots.”

The two 3-pointers were Thomas’ only points of the game.

“We got three stops in a row and got it to within six, and then things just fell apart,” Colonels coach Tm Wygant said.

Wood made a desperate effort to recover by shooting 3s in the final period. The strategy backfired as Wood only hit one of nine attempts during the final quarter and finished just 3-of-14 from the field during the period.

The Colonels also shot just 2-of-6 from the foul line in the fourth period.

“We just had a bad shooting night,” Wygant said. “We were patient in the first half and made a couple of shots then. Millbrook’s defense was challenging to say the least, and we missed some shots that we normally hit, and got ourselves into a hole.”

The Colonels got off to a good start, using a tenacious, physical defense to limit Millbrook to just seven first-quarter field goal attempts.

While the Pioneers struggled to get good looks at the basket, Wood’s Vincent Lew was lighting up the scoreboard with 3-pointers. The Colonels senior hit two during the period to spark the 12-9 Wood lead.

“It was back and forth in the first half, and I think that James Wood dictated the pace of the game,” Bates said. “Their game is to keep the score down in the 30s. For the first 18 minutes of the game they did a real good job of that. We finally got some rebounds, started hitting our shots, and our offense began to adjust.”

Jackson led the Pioneers with 11 points. Ben Curtin added 10 points, while Jordan Funk and Jalen Tyson both had seven points.

No James Wood player scored in double figures. Sam Costin led the Colonels with eight, while Aidan Houser had seven.