Postmen Deliver for Brookville
J. C. Tilton
It was rival week for Brookville and Dixie. The girls had played earlier with Brookville easily landing on top for that win. Would the boys be able to duplicate that feat? The Dixie boys(3-1) have enjoyed some early success, but Brookville (2-5) has had a rough start to the season. The Dixie team has had a two week break and entered the holidays on a down note, losing a close game to Waynesville. On the other hand Brookville did play over the winter break and kept their motors running. And the team is 2-1 over their last three games so they had some momentum.
Dixie quickly threw their press at Brookville and they would sporadically call upon the press thru out the game. They generated some turnovers with the press, but weren't efficient at converting the steals into points. For the game, Dixie would end up a respectable +8 on turnovers. The team looked a little rusty in first quarter, but kept pace with Brookville down only 10-9 at the end of the quarter. Johnny Adams did the bulk of the scoring for the Greyhounds with 7 points. On the other end of the court, Brookville's strategy was to feed the post. They did ring it up from outside on occasion, but the game was a fight for the paint.
The second quarter settled into a defensive struggle. Dixie's Chuck Poynter had a good quarter, stealing the ball and feeding it to Kevin McBain for one basket and hitting a trey to keep pace with Brookville. Dixie did have some looks from outside, but the shots were clanging off the iron. Brookville adjusted defensively and had a spy on Dixie's scoring threat Johnny Adams, while the rest of the team went into a zone. Both Chris Mack and Matt Dill were tapped thru out the game to man up against Adams. Dixie stuck with their base man to man. The play got sloppy in the last minute and a half as both teams combined for 4 turnovers and couldn't get any offense going. Both defenses were effective as each team scored only 7 points and Brookville retained their one point lead going into the locker room.
The second half started with both teams number 40's trading baskets. It was a battle of the big men. Ben Spahr knocked down a couple of baskets for Dixie and Nick Tidd likewise had 2 baskets for Brookville. There was an intentional foul called at about the 5 minute mark. Matt Dill was called for contact against Jared Moore of Dixie. I wondered if this would change the momentum of an already tight game. Moore's free throw gave Dixie the lead for the first time in the second half. But this only seemed to add resolve to Brookville. From there the Brookville defense clamped down on Dixie. They continued to pound the ball inside to McDaniel and Tidd and from midquarter on a little daylight began to open between the two teams. Brookville put together a little 11-4 run toward the end of the quarter, Dixie did come back at the end, but they were able to enter the last quarter up by 6. The momentum had swung over to the Blue Devil side of the gym.
The game loosened up in the last quarter as Dixie tried to make up ground. They pressed to try and capture turnovers. But the fouls began to accumulate and towards the end of the quarter both team were in bonus. Johnny Adams, who had been held scoreless in the third quarter, tried to spark a Dixie rally. But Brookville forward Sean McDaniel had other ideas. He lead the way for Brookville with several baskets in transition. He had most of his game high 19 points in this quarter. When time ran out, Brookville proved that the boys can do it too with a 50-39 win.
“First of all you throw out their record and our record because it is a rivalry game.” said Brookville's Coach Gentis, “We prepared hard for this weekend. We've had some good quarters thru out the year, we just haven't put 4 quarters together. It was the first time we put together 4 solid quarters of basketball and this is the result. We just have to believe that we can do it on a nightly basis.” He was then asked about the post play of Brookville, “It's no secret that our strength is inside. Our game plan is to shoot it inside as much as we can. If our guards can handle the pressure outside, our post is going to get it done.”
“They came to play and we didn't”, summed up Dixie Coach Miller. We were out rebounded by 14, we couldn't shoot our shots. We have had defenses pay attention to Johnny [Adams] before and we had forwards pick it up. They always get up for us and we didn't play well on their court. It was one of our worst efforts this season.” Things do not get easier for Dixie as they have to play 5 games in 9 games - and 4 of those are away.
Scoring for Brookville: Baker 3, Brown 4, Lathrop 3, Lemons 5, Mack 6, McDaniel 19, Tidd 10. Dixie: Adams 16, Kummer 1, McBain 4, Moore 6, Poynter 3, Spahr 9. Comments: email: Chris Tilton
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