Boyle County boys improve to 3-0 in 45th District play with win at Garrard

Published 12:14 am Saturday, January 20, 2018

 

LANCASTER — Boyle County battled foul trouble but had the answers Friday in Lancaster.

The Rebels shot 60 percent in the second half to stride past Garrard County 77-61 to improve to 3-0 in the 45th District.

Email newsletter signup

Bryce Slone sat for most of the first half with foul trouble, and three other Boyle starters were limited to a cheering role on the bench due to fouls. But the Rebels’ bench kept the team in the game and allowed for a hot-shooting second half to carry them to victory.

“It’s the first game we’ve had in 10 days, not a lot of practice time because of the weather,” Boyle head coach Steve Adams said. “You’re going to be rusty, and coming into this environment where, for whatever reason we don’t play well. We knew it was going to be tough. But I thought the kids did a great job in the second half of coming out, doing what we needed to do defensively and that got us going offensively.”

The game was slow early, and Garrard’s gameplan to attack the basket worked well: Boyle starters Slone and Will Bramel played a combined seven minutes in the first half due to foul trouble, and fellow starters Jason Alexander and Grant Hotchkiss also missed action with two fouls.

Reese Smith carried the Rebels’ offense in the first half, scoring 11 points.

It was a good start for Garrard, but the Golden Lions were limited on defense due to big-man Charles Jones missing the game due to a suspension he picked up at GRC on Jan. 6.

Garrard head coach Ryan Young said the goal was to get Bramel out of the paint on defense, and his team executed that well.

“Will Bramel is such a big force, he takes up a lot of space and he’s really improved overall,” Young said. “His offensive game is really nice this year. The plan was to try to bring him out on the floor, attack him off of the dribble and it worked. I don’t think we did very well with our activity in our zone early, we let Hotchkiss slide behind us several times. When you play zone, you’re going to give up some things. We weren’t capable of playing man tonight with our limited size, which hurt us.”

Slone scored three points in the first half in three minutes of action. In the second half, he played all 16 minutes and scored 20 points, finishing with a game-high 23 points. He was 9-of-12 from the field and 5-for-7 beyond the arc.

Hotchkiss lit up the stat sheet in a different way: He finished just two assists shy of a triple-double, posting 11 points, 12 rebounds and eight assists.

With Slone missing time, Adams turned to sophomore Cameron Yates. Yates scored 11 points, going 3-for-3 from beyond the arc.

“Cam stepped up, made some big baskets and got some loose balls for us,” Adams said. “He was knocking down open shots. That’s the biggest thing that we needed. Right now, we haven’t been shooting it real well. Especially with Bryce in foul trouble and on the bench, we just needed somebody that could knock down open shots and open up the defense. He was able to do it, and he’s been doing a nice job in practice. He got a real late start, plays football, had appendicitis, then he got sick, so he’s just now trying to come back into his own. But he’s a nice weapon for us.”

Young said it was Yates’ shooting that hurt his team’s comeback late in the game.

“We did compete better for three quarters, but we had a great opportunity tonight and we just didn’t capitalize down the stretch,” Young said. “But they played great, they shot the heck out of it tonight. Give them credit, they had that left-handed kid come off of the bench, he made some big shots down the stretch every time we got close.”

Boyle led by three points at the end of the third quarter, and foul trouble again kept Boyle’s starting quartet limited.

But in the fourth quarter, the Rebels looked rested — and Garrard was worn down.

“We did a much better job, the turnovers we had we didn’t want to be live-ball turnovers. But like I said, (Boyle) has some good players who are aggressive and attack the basketball,” Young said. “Give them credit, they made some tough plays on the ball and their activity picked up in the fourth quarter and we didn’t match it.”

Garrard was led by Braden Sebastian’s 20 points and eight rebounds. Justin Preston scored 19 points and pulled down eight rebounds to go with five assists.

“We challenged them, both of them, to play more aggressive,” Young said. “Boyle is a good half-court defensive team, I thought they could get under them and make us uncomfortable. Going into the game, we wanted to attack with a purpose, dribble with a purpose and keep the ball moving better. I thought we played well offensively in stretches tonight, but I think we hit a wall in the second half with our limited depth and that hurt us.”

Adams credited his bench for stepping up when the starters had foul trouble.

“Caleb Jackson, Matthew Bodner, Jacob Lassiter all came in and did a nice job for us,” Adams said. “Everybody contributed and we did what we needed to do.”

Boyle moves to 3-0 in district play and will next visit Lincoln County in 45th District play. The Rebels’ game with the Patriots that was scheduled for last week will now be played Wednesday, Jan. 31.

“Now if the weather would cooperate and we can get in the gym and get back in our routine and get going, that’ll be good,” Adams said. “Bryce twisted his ankle at the Danville game and he’s still not 100 percent. The rest probably helped him. Hopefully we can get on a nice roll.”

The Golden Lions drop to 0-2 in district play — both losses to Boyle — and will host Lincoln on Wednesday.

“We’ve played a really difficult schedule. In my opinion, it’s one of the most difficult schedules around this area,” Young said. “What I learned, I like our competitive fight tonight. We still don’t make the game-winning plays towards the end of the game, but like I was talking to them, we’ve got 30 days left, let’s get better every day and see where the chips fall. I still think it’s wide open and I believe in these guys. I hate moral victories but even in a loss, I thought their competitive fight took a step forward tonight.”

 

At Garrard County

 

BC 13 17 20 27 77

GC 16 14 17 14 61

Points

BOYLE — Bryce Slone 23, Reese Smith 19, Grant Hotchkiss 11, Cameron Yates 11, Will Bramel 7, Jason Alexander 6.

GARRARD — Braden Sebastian 20, Justin Preston 19, Trevor Jones 10, Brice Burkhart 9, Carter Moss 3.

 

Rebounds

BOYLE — Grant Hotchkiss 12, Cameron Yates 3, Caleb Jackson 2, Jason Alexander 2, Bryce Slone 2, Will Bramel 2, Jacob Lassiter 2, Reese Smith 1.

GARRARD — Justin Preston 8, Braden Sebastian 8, Brice Burkhart 5, Trevor Jones 2.

 

Assists

BOYLE — Grant Hotchkiss 8, Jason Alexander 4, Caleb Jackson 2, Cameron Yates 2, Reese Smith 1, Will Bramel 1.

GARRARD — Justin Preston 5, Braden Sebastian 2, Carter Moss 1, Trevor Jones 1.