Gators top James Kenan

By Allen Etzler
Published in Sports on February 22, 2015 12:09 AM

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Cam Ellis

cellis@newsargus.com

CALYPSO -- It's not a secret that when Spring Creek's starting backcourt of Brandon Gonzalez and Trey Hammonds are playing well, they're tough to beat.

But when the Gators get big time contributions from other players - most notably Gary Williams - it may well be impossible.

Williams poured in a team-high 15 points on Friday night, leading Spring Creek to a 68-55 win over James Kenan in the Carolina 1-A conference championship game.

It's been a long time coming for a team that has played together for three years now.

"(Winning the 1A championship) feels great," Williams said. "I feel like we've been working towards this since we were sophomores."

The Gators won in convincing fashion, carrying out their game plan flawlessly in a wire-to-wire win that silenced many who had doubts about who the best team in Carolina 1-A might be.

"We were even before tonight," coach Taylor Jones said. "I considered us before tonight to be conference champions. The fact of the matter is that our guys had to win tonight. Everybody wanted to win tonight."

Williams, a senior who often spends time in the shadows of Spring Creek's more well known guards, set the tone early by hitting two three-pointers in the first quarter. He scored six points in the first quarter, when the Gators outscored Kenan 18-6.

"He had to be big," Hammonds said. "Gary's a big player. He's just as big as me or Brandon or anybody else. He did good picking up the ropes."

John Brooks had a game-high 21 points for James Kenan. The Tigers put together a few runs, but ultimately couldn't dig themselves out of the hole they put themselves in during the first quarter. They struggled throughout the game to keep up with the speed of Spring Creek's guards.

Williams aside, the Gators got the rest of their production from the usual suspects. Hammonds finished with 13 points, despite sitting on the bench for major chunks of the game because of foul trouble.

Brandon Gonzalez added 10 while running Spring Creek's high-speed offense with ease. The Gators finished with 19 assists, a stat Jones attributed to their maturity and unselfishness.

With the weather causing delays and cancellations all week, the team relied on their senior leadership to make sure they didn't miss a beat.

"Every time they came into a huddle, the guys were saying that 'we're fine, we're going to win'" Jones said. "It was just a matter of how and when. Seniority definitely helped."

During the week, Jones talked at length about how the game would come down to who could get more production from their bench.

The Gators answered the call, getting key points from Jordan Hicks (11 points) and Justin Cianfara (8). Hicks, who scored six of his 11 points in the 4th quarter, was especially helpful on the glass, providing Spring Creek with the height to match up with a much taller Kenan team.

"I thought this was probably as good as a team win as we've had all year," Jones said. "We have balance. We've got several guys that can make plays. But tonight, everybody made plays. [The bench players] were huge for us tonight, both scoring and on defense."

Despite it already being one of the most successful years in program history, Spring Creek has its eyes set on a larger prize.

"We didn't want anyone to think we were just going to roll over," Hammonds said. "We've just got to keep playing with a chip on our shoulder."

"Every game is big from now on."