the Cafe
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Knights Beat Rival I.R.
for 4th Straight Victory
By DAVID MAULL, Cafe Locale
The weirdness started during pregame warmups, when Sussex Central was assessed a technical foul for dunking the ball and reprimanded by the officials for wearing the wrong colored T-shirts under its game jerseys.
It continued when Indian River's top scorer was ejected in the game's closing minutes for committing a flagrant foul.
In between those freak occurrences, Central notched a sloppy 57-44 victory over its school district rival on Tuesday, Jan. 26, 1999, and moved above .500 for the first time this season. The win in Frankford was the Golden Knights' fourth straight and improved their record to 8-7 overall and 6-6 in the conference.
"It makes me feel good that the guys are finally stepping up and playing ball a lot better than they did at the beginning of the season," said Central boys basketball coach Tim Slade, whose team is now in the thick of the state tournament race. "I always felt we had a chance (to reach the tournament) ... that once we got a little experience we'd be OK."
But Tuesday's win was far from perfect. The Knights played with a noticeable lack of fire most of the evening and let winless IR stay within striking distance until midway through the final period.
Central trailed by as many as seven in the opening period before finally taking the lead for good late in the first half. At one point in the first quarter, an exasperated Slade turned to his assistants and announced, "We are flat tonight boys."
"Whenever we play teams that they think they're going to dominate, the team just doesn't get up for it," Slade said. "I was trying anything in this world that could get them pumped up. I was reliving my history with it, I was just saying this is a district rivalry, I said it was bragging rights. They just weren't pumped."
Leading by just six early in the fourth quarter, the Knights used strong half-court defensive pressure to force a series of IR turnovers. This sparked the run that finally allowed Central to pull away.
John Gordy and George Dutton each finished with 16 points for Central.
"I guess we thought just because they were 0-13 ... they wouldn't be that good but it turned out they were pretty decent. We just underestimated them," Gordy said.
Indian River fell to 0-14 overall despite another gutsy effort from a lineup dominated by young and inexperienced players. Anthony Jones led the Indians with 14 points while Billy Hall added 11 and James Bratten 10.
"We turned them over probably at least 15 times (on defense)," IR coach Pay Kelly said. "We're trying to get them to execute some basic things offensively. We weren't real pleased with our man-to-man defense tonight. We need to work more on that and rebound better. We need to have more balance offensively."
IR's solid effort was marred by the ejection of Jones, who committed a flagrant foul on Central's Tony Cintron with 1:16 left in the game. The team's leading scorer is now ineligible for Friday night's game at Caesar Rodney.
Central led 45-35 after three periods but IR used layups from Jones and Mike Lord early in the fourth quarter to cut the Central lead to six with 6:22 to play. But the Knights turned up the defensive intensity and went on a 12-3 run to put the game away. Dutton had a pair of baskets during the rally while Cintron sank a 14-footer and Drew Mills put back a missed shot.
The Indians managed just two field goals in the game's final six minutes.
"At the end finally we turned it up and we did what we had to do to win," Slade said. "It was ugly, but it was a win. I don't know what happened but something sparked those guys and they started playing really good at the end. I wish all quarters were like that."
It was different story earlier in the game. Central's Travis Leonard was called for technical foul after dunking during pregame warmups and the Indians drained the two ensuing foul shots to open the game. IR then got a quick 3-pointer from Jones and raced to an early 12-5 lead.
But Central pulled itself together late in the first quarter, using a full-court press to create transition baskets. A 3-pointer by Dutton cut the IR lead to 14-10 at the end of the opening period and Central used a 15-3 second-quarter run to take the lead it would never relinquish. Dutton sank another three during the spurt while James Cannon had two layups and a put-back, putting the Knights ahead 27-19.
IR fought within 29-23 at halftime and stayed close throughout a fast-paced third quarter in which both teams ran the fast break. The Knights were repeatedly able to shred IR's interior defense for layups.
"We let them get position in the low post," Kelly said. "(Gordy) was like a man among boys."
Central faces Woodbridge Friday night before entering a make-or-break, three-week stretch in which it faces Henlopen North opponents Caesar Rodney, Dover, Seaford, Cape Henlopen and Woodbridge.
"We started off 0-4 at one point. We're on a roll now," Gordy said. "We're a young team. Not many people on our team had varsity experience and now we're starting to get the hang of each other better.I think we're going to surprise some people coming up here at the end of the season."
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