The Perryville boys basketball team out-muscled Rising Sun 56-52 in a physical, foul-filled game Tuesday night, January 16. The Panthers led 13-8 at the end of the first quarter and never trailed the rest of the way.
"We started pretty sluggish," Rising Sun coach John Walker said. "We had a hard time recovering from that…It's been hard the last few weeks not practicing much with all the weather and we can't practice because of school getting canceled. We just came out sluggish. We have to come and start to play harder." Perryville led by as many as 10 points early in the third quarter before Rising Sun rallied. Five straight points cut the deficit in half but the Panthers' Billy Boyer buried a three-pointer. Rising Sun roared back again. Trey Walker (14 points) and Ethan Greene had consecutive three-point plays. After Perryville was assessed a technical foul for not having a player entered in the scorebook, Walker hit two free throws to tie the game at 41 with 1:33 left in the third quarter. "They played some pretty good, aggressive defense and we had to adapt to that," John Walker said. "I tell my team all the team we can't be frustrated by things we don't control. We've just got to keep our minds on playing hard. They did that and we went on a nice little run." The Panthers regained the lead on a TyeSean Stephenson putback. Emarion Hampton opened the fourth quarter with three consecutive points to lengthen the lead to 46-41 and Perryville held a 55-45 edge with 3:30 to go. The Tigers mounted one final comeback attempt and trailed 55-52 with 20 seconds remaining. "You can see some of our inexperience sneaking through there," Perryville coach Chris Johnson said. "We want them to come to us and not come to them because time is their enemy, not ours. We talked. They understand now. From now on, we've got to spread it out. We've got to work on the hard press. We practice it a lot, but we've got to practice it a lot more, just trying to get separation from the man and get the ball up the court because they did a nice job pressing us toward the end of the game and forcing us into a couple turnovers. I think we were a little tired there toward the end. They were getting some rebounds. So we've got to address that." Hampton missed the front end of a one-and-one with 10.8 ticks left, but Rising Sun was called for a lane violation and the Panthers' freshman point guard took advantage of his second chance by making his first free throw to make it a two-possession game. Both teams struggled to adjust to the officiating, resulting in a lot of hand-check fouls 30 feet from the basket. "It is really frustrating when you can't really move the offense," Perryville forward Caleb Robinson said. "As soon as you do, somebody fouls or something happens…It's really hard to establish momentum in a game like that. They probably came back due to a lot of the fouls." Greene, the focal point of Perryville's defense, still managed to score 18 points. The Panthers rotated several players on Greene, including Stephenson, Kenyatta Bailey, Robinson, and Dayvon Montz. "I thought we did a really good job," Johnson said. "That kid's a nice athlete. I love his demeanor, the way he carries himself. I thought even though we had some guys who were undersized, we put strong kids against him and I think that really helped out, kind of limiting him. He's going to get his points. He's going to get his rebounds. He's a good athlete but I think we kind of limited the damage, which is what you want to try to do when you play a guy like that, whose got that height, got some ups, and is strong, a good athlete…He's a good kid." Johnson is happy with the way his team has been playing. "It was a great game," the coach said. "Great county rival. Two teams playing very hard. I'm pleased we're now 3-1 in the new year. We're making progress. I saw a lot of good ball movement, saw a lot of good defense, good man defense. I'm pleased with the progress we're making." Comments are closed.
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