by bryce phillips

star staff

bryce.phillips@elizabethton.com

It was a team affair for the Hampton Bulldogs, who had 12 scorers for the game, as they put a 83-57 stamp on Cloudland up on Roan Mountain.

“They shared the ball real well …,” Hampton coach Ned Smith said. “ We got some young kids in there and got them some minutes. You never know who you are going to have to play in tournaments.”

Leading the way for the Bulldogs was Coby Jones, who had 22 points. Stanley Valentine followed with 14.

“It feels great,” Jones said about the ‘Dogs’ win. “It feels especially great for the seniors who got to win their last match-up with Cloudland in the regular season.”

For Cloudland, Preston Benfield played hard as he ended the night with the game high of 26 points.

“He is a great player,” Jones said. “Any time he comes out, he is going to compete. It is like that every time we play Cloudland. It is always a dog fight. Cloudland is wanting to win. We are wanting to win. It is a brawl through out the game.”

Coming into the second period up 18-9, Hampton had a 13-2 run to put themselves up 43-21 going into the half.

With Hampton up 60-27, Benfield made back-to-back buckets to give Cloudland a little momentum as they put up an unanswered nine points at the end of the third to put them behind the ‘Dogs 60-36.

In the fourth, the teams swapped shots with Hampton outscoring Cloudland, 23-21.

“We didn’t play very well early on,” Cloudland coach Gary Harrison said. “We had a lot of open looks that we just missed. … We played defense pretty decent there for a little bit, we have a lot of stuff that we have to work on. Tonight, our effort was not were it needed to be. … We had the opportunity to take a couple of charges that we got out of the way of. Coach Smith has done an excellent job with his boys. They turned us over and we played right into their hands.”

Coach Smith felt that his boys came out strong and were able to get the ball to where it need to be.

“I thought the guys came out real well,” he said. “. . . We made some outside shots, then they came out, and we threw it inside. I thought we played real well. Good chemistry tonight.”