Rangers unable to hang on, fall to South Greene 64-41
Published 11:06 pm Tuesday, January 27, 2015
By Collin Brooks
Correspondent
The Rangers fought the Rebels tooth and nail for the first two quarters, but they were unable to continue the fight in the second half, dropping the contest 64-41 against South Greene Tuesday night.
A big part of the loss was the Rangers’ 33 turnovers.
“We turned over the basketball too much,” Unaka coach Aaron Dugger said. “That isn’t going to cut it, especially against a good team like South Greene. You turn the ball over that many times, they’re good enough to extend the lead.”
South Greene, the first-place team in the Watauga Valley Conference, took advantage of those turnovers with not only baskets, but three-pointers. They connected on eight in the contest, with five of them coming in the first half.
Logan Tweed led the Rebels with 21 points. Trey Brown finished the night with 15. The Rangers had one player score in double figures with Joe Searfross gaining 10 points. Kyler Lewis helped with nine points, Travis Overdorf with five.
After Unaka entered the locker room down just 29-22, things got going quickly to begin the second half, as the Rebels opened the third period on a 12-6 run in the first three minutes of the quarter, which allowed them to grab a 41-28 lead.
The Rebels went on to outscore the Rangers 10-4 for the remainder of the quarter, to take a 51-32 lead into the final period.
Dugger was happy with his team’s effort but says they have some things they need to work on to get where they want to be.
“We have to keep trying to get better skillwise,” Dugger said. “We’ve got guys that just have a hard time, right now, putting it on the floor and trying to make a play. We struggled to score in stretches because our offensive skill isn’t where it needs to be right now.
“And that is just where we are at. We have to keep getting better, and they are doing that. We have a long way to go, but I like our attitude and they are playing hard.”
During the first two quarters, the teams went back and forth, but the Rebels were able to take a 13-9 lead after the first quarter and only expanded on that lead during the second period, to the point that they took a 29-22 lead into the locker room.
The Rangers were never able to overcome the turnovers on the night with 17 in the first half.
“The first half, if you take anything away from it, we were down seven with our point guard on the bench,” Dugger said. “We played hard, the second half just got away from us with our turnovers. We just have to keep getting better, that’s the name of the game.”
________
Unaka has rescheduled a game against Happy Valley. The game was originally scheduled for Feb. 7, will now be played on Feb. 5 at Unaka.
______
BOX SCORE
South Greene 13 16 22 13 — 64
Unaka 9 13 10 9 — 41
South Greene — Tweed 21, Brown 15, Worells 10, Brown 6, Babb 3, Ray 2, Alcantaron 2, Shaw 1, Burns 1.
Unaka — Searfross 10, Lewis 9, Overdorf 5, Pierce 4, Parlier 4, Guinn 3, Wright 2, Davenport 2, Cocklin 2.
3-Pointers — South Greene 8 (Brown 3, Tweed 2, Worells 2, Babb 1), Unaka 1 (Lewis).
