RED SPRINGS — One is the loneliest number, and also the margin that the Red Springs boys basketball team couldn’t overcome in the second half to Dillon on Thursday night when it was eliminated from the Robeson County Shootout at home.
“We had opportunities. I called a timeout and told them to call a play because we were just playing freelance. Every time we called out a play we got a shot,” Red Springs coach Glenn Patterson said after his team’s 67-61 loss to the Wildcats. “We had poor execution down the stretch when we cut it to one on a couple possessions. We turned it over and we took a poor shot. We’ve got to do a better job of making every possession count.”
The win moves Dillon into Saturday’s fifth-place game to play South Robeson at Noon.
Red Springs (3-5) trailed by as much as 11 in the contest to Dillon (1-1), and trimmed the lead on several occasions in the final two quarters.
In the third quarter, the Wildcats’ lead was trimmed from 33-26 at the half to 41-40 with 2:37 on a Jayshawn Carthen layup. Dillon responded to take a 46-42 advantage to the fourth quarter.
A barrage of 3-pointers from Dillon to start the final period pushed the lead to seven points with more than six minutes left, showing signs of running away with the contest. Red Springs sophomore duo of Corell Love and Gary Locklear provided a scoring lift in the loss, but their impact was most felt in crunch time as they scored 12 of their combined 24 points in the fourth.
Locklear scored five points in a three-minute stretch to close the Dillon lead to 57-56 with 1:03 left, and Love’s layup with 40 seconds left made it 59-58, but that would be as close as the Red Devils would get.
Dillon’s Corrian Wright scored the next eight points to seal the win. He finished with 12 points.
Love and Locklear’s night came when the starting post players from Red Springs struggled to find their rhythm. Love posted a double-double with 11 points and 14 rebounds against a sizeable Dillon frontline.
“I’m not afraid of other players. I was just doing my position of getting rebounds and going back up with them,” Love said. “I had to step up because Shyheim’s (Richardson) hand is injured right now.”
Locklear had 13 points with a pair of 3-pointers in the second half.
“I told them that I didn’t pull them up to sit the bench. Tonight they got the call and stepped up to the challenge,” Patterson said. “If we’re going to lose, I’d rather lose with underclassmen.”
Red Springs’ Keagan Brayboy scored 20 points to lead all scorers. Zy’air Charles had 13 points as well for Dillon.
Lady Devils advance past Fairmont
RED SPRINGS — The 46-22 win over Fairmont wasn’t pretty, but Red Springs girls basketball coach Robert Dove said he will take it.
The win insures Red Springs (4-5) gets one more game in the Shootout, as it takes on South Robeson on Saturday in the fifth-place game at 10 a.m.
“This is all about having our team play several games and try to improve every time we go out,” Dove said of the Shootout.
The Lady Red Devils held Fairmont (0-6) to two made baskets in the second half. The Lady Golden Tornadoes posted four points in each of the first three quarters and then nine points in the fourth.
“I see improvement every game. We may get blown out every game, but tonight we got the ball up against their presses,” Fairmont coach Richard Mitchell said. “Tonight we missed a boatload of layups tonight and I told them that, ‘If you get down there to shoot layups, then put it in.’”
Taylynn Atkinson had a game-high 14 points, while Raven Cox, Jalexis Bratcher and Winter Chavis each added nine points for Red Springs. Fairmont’s Georgianna Waters had 10 points.
