Hunt girls avoid fourth-quarter meltdown, beat Aycock by 10

By Rudy Coggins
Published in Sports on January 14, 2007 2:21 AM

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PIKEVILLE -- Charles B. Aycock girls' basketball coach Carrie Reynell quickly scanned the shot chart and glanced at the scoreboard as the first half ended Friday evening.

"Unbelievable," Reynell said as she headed toward the locker room.

The Golden Falcons labored through a ragged first half and trailed Wilson Hunt by 16 points. Poor shooting and lack of transition play allowed the Warriors to claim their double-digit lead.

"I don't know where we were mentally in the first half," said Reynell. "I think a lot of it had to do with almost half of the girls probably didn't have an exam today, and were sitting around (at home).

"You can't sit around, but it's a little easier said than done."

C.B. Aycock, however, nearly pulled off a miraculous second-half comeback. The Golden Falcons trimmed the deficit to five points in the final 81 seconds, but the Warriors held on 55-45.

Hunt (9-6 overall) moved into a second-place tie with Eastern Wayne at 2-1 in the Class 3-A Eastern Carolina Conference standings. The Golden Falcons (6-11) dipped to 1-2 against league opposition.

Reynell's team managed just 12 first-half points on 6 of 23 shooting from the floor. Aycock committed 13 turnovers and averaged a meager 0.3 points per possession.

"The first half we gave them a lot of easy stuff in the middle and that's what hurt us," said Reynell. "They knew we had (good) guard play and did a good job covering our guards, and we didn't do a good job of making adjustments like we should have."

The third quarter and first minute of the fourth quarter mirrored the opening half. The Warriors flourished in their transition game, controlled the offensive boards and extended their halftime margin to 49-29.

Hunt head coach Willie Thomas substituted his younger players into the game, and it nearly proved disastrous.

The Golden Falcons applied defensive pressure and forced six consecutive turnovers. The 20-point deficit quickly dwindled to 49-42 when Bridgette Briggs canned an uncontested layup off Chantel Gaines' assist.

"I tried to give some other girls some playing time, and they got rattled ... allowed them to get the momentum," said Thomas. "They applied the pressure and we sort of panicked a little bit. We did too much dribbling and I screamed for the guards to look up because we had girls (open) underneath the basket.

"I thought we had them out (of the game), but they fought and got back in it."

The Golden Falcons pulled within 50-45 with 1:21 remaining in regulation. But they failed to score again and the Warriors polished off their sixth road victory of the season with a 5 of 7 effort at the free throw line.

Chelsea Atkinson and Krystal Smith emerged Hunt's top scorers with 17 points apiece. The Warriors converted 8 of 11 free throws in the final quarter and finished 11 of 18 for the game.

Jasmine Dobbin paced Aycock's attack with 15 points, while Jazzmine Lee piled up 10 points -- all in the second half. Lee recorded her 12th double-figure effort of the season. Gaines finished with nine points, six rebounds and three assists. Briggs provided five points, five rebounds, four blocked shots and two assists.

"I told the girls (the second half) proves what kind of team we are when we show up mentally versus when we don't," said Reynell. "They gave me every effort in the second half, played well and gutted it out.

"That just gives us some motivation for the next game."

C.B. Aycock's boys gave Wilson Hunt 20-plus second-chance opportunities throughout the 32-minute contest and suffered a 73-35 loss.

The Golden Falcons (0-3 ECC) remained winless in 17 outings. Hunt, ranked No. 5 in the NCPreps.com 3-A poll, improved to 13-2 overall and gained sole possession of the ECC lead at 3-0.

"They were beasts under (the basket)," Aycock coach David West said of Hunt. "When you can finally sell to your guys it doesn't matter how big that guy is under there, if you can get the right position on him and can box him out, he can't go anywhere.

"That's a hard sell to a lot of basketball players."

The Warriors tallied eight points off 10 offensive rebounds in the opening quarter and built a 10-2 lead. Aycock failed to cross midcourt for nearly two minutes during one stretch of play.

"I didn't think we played that bad defensively in the first quarter," said Aycock head coach David West. "We had some shots that just didn't fall, but they had even more that didn't fall. It could have been worse.

"They just started hitting some of those shots in the second quarter."

Hunt owned a 28-15 advantage at halftime and put the game out of reach early in the third period. The Warriors hit 6 of 7 shots from the floor and forced nine turnovers on 10 Aycock possessions in a 19-2 run.

West's team never recovered.

"There were a couple of stretches where we laid back and didn't play as hard as we've been playing," said West. "They got a good lead and after that, it was pretty much over."

Alex Peacock led the Golden Falcons with six points, while Leonard Compton and Jonathan Williams each scored five.

Justin Dunn paced Hunt's attack with a game-high 14 points. Alton Vinson and Kason Cheeks contributed 12 and 11 points, respectively.

Girls game

Hunt 9 19 10 17 -- 55

C.B. Aycock 4 8 14 19 -- 45

WILSON HUNT (9-6, 2-1)

Lauren Langley 0 0 0-0 0, Victoria White 0 0 1-2 1, Jessica McNair 3 0 0-0 6, Chelsea Atkinson 5 2 1-2 17, Quilla Parker 0 0 4-6 4, Krystal Smith 6 0 5-8 17, Kiara Jones 0 2 0-0 6, Crystal Artis 1 0 0-0 2, Spencer Winbourne 1 0 0-0 2. TOTALS -- 16 4 11-18 55.

C.B. AYCOCK (6-11, 1-2)

Jasmine Dobbin 4 1 4-6 15, Amanda Schlaeppi 0 0 0-0 0, Yolanda Pitt 0 0 0-0 0, Jazzmine Lee 3 1 1-1 10, Chantel Gaines 4 0 1-2 9, Erin Medford 0 0 0-0 0, Bridgette Briggs 2 0 1-2 5, Megan Yelverton 0 0 0-0 0, Lauren Pratt 3 0 0-3 6, Briana Reid 0 0 0-2 0. TOTALS -- 16 2 7-16 45.

Boys game

Hunt 10 18 24 21 -- 73

C.B. Aycock 2 13 8 12 -- 35

WILSON HUNT (13-2, 3-0)

Torez Jones 3 0 0-1 6, Jamil Creech 1 0 0-0 2, David Hesmer 0 0 0-0 0, Bobby White 1 0 0-0 2, Justin Dunn 2 3 1-2 14, Jeff Reardon 1 0 1-2 3, Jermaine Edwards 1 0 0-1 2, Alton Vinson 3 0 6-8 12, Jamel Joyner 3 0 0-0 6, Kason Cheeks 3 0 5-8 11, Devrine Barnes 3 0 3-4 9, Leron Jones 3 0 0-0 6. TOTALS -- 23 3 16-26 73.

C.B. AYCOCK (0-17, 0-3)

David Gurganus 0 1 1-2 4, Alex Peacock 1 1 1-1 6, Quantay Poole 2 0 0-0 4, Leonard Compton 1 1 0-0 5, Devon Newsome 0 0 0-0 0, Jonathan Williams 1 0 3-4 5, Evan Medford 0 1 0-0 3, Daniel Pennington 0 0 0-0 0, Kendre Reid 1 0 0-0 2, Jordan Yawn 1 0 0-0 2, Jovaneta Taylor 1 0 0-0 2, Jacob Pendleton 0 0 0-0 0, Michael King 1 0 0-0 2. TOTALS -- 9 4 5-7 35.