Calhoun basketball ends first week at 1-1

Saturday game with Paulding County rescheduled for Wednesday, Dec. 8

After the first week of the season, the Calhoun High School basketball team is 1-1.

They began the season last week with a 68-64 road loss to Harrison, but got into the win column last Thursday night for the first time this year with a 74-51 victory over Woodstock in their rescheduled home opener.

Calhoun head basketball coach Vince Layson said other than not being 2-0, there was nothing to be disappointed about after the first set of games.

“We would like to have won both of our games last week because that is what you’re playing for, but if anything, I thought the kids did a great job and really, surpassed our expectations,” Layson said. “I mean we had a lot of players step up that were playing in their first varsity action and I thought they did well.

“The guys we were really counting on, like Dylan (Faulkner) and Jaylan (Harris), while we are waiting for a few of our players to return (from football), did a real good job last week. They both scored a lot of points, but we had others who stepped up and did a good job in really their first game experience, so we would like to have won both games and I felt like we could have, but seeing the way guys handled themselves their first time out really surpassed what we were looking for.”

During their first two games, the 6-foot-8 Faulkner scored 60 points combined with 26 against Harrison and then 34 against Woodstock while Harris was also lethal, notching 18 in the opener and than 20 against Woodstock, meaning that dynamic duo outscored the Wolverines all by themselves, 54-51.

“Right now, we are looking for that third scorer and I challenged my guys at practice (Sunday night) as far as who would be that third guy who would come in and start scoring for us after those two,” Layson said. “But those two have gotten off to great starts, especially at the offensive end, but we definitely looking for that third guy who can consistently score for us. And I feel like we’ve got a number of candidates who can fill that role, we just need to have someone step up and be that guy.”

In the win over Woodstock, the game was close after the first period, but the Yellow Jackets stepped up their defense over the last three quarters, giving up only 34 points in the final 24 minutes to win rather decisively.

The visitors took a 17-16 lead after the first period, but scored 12 points in the second, just 10 in the third, and a dozen more in the fourth as the home team pulled away.

Down by one after the initial quarter, Calhoun topped Woodstock, 23-12, in the second to hold a 10-point lead at halftime, 39-29.

In a low-scoring third period, the hosts outscored Woodstock, 13-10 to take a 52-39 lead into the fourth, where they added 22 more points.

“The kids played well,” Layson said. “I thought defensively, especially in the second half, we played very well. We tried to do some different things defensively in our second game and try to kind of expand on what we’ve been working on with our (traps) and trying to speed up the tempo and things like that and I thought the kids did a good job with it. We’ve still got a lot of work to do and lot to work on, but for

a first time with some of the things we were doing defensively, I was very impressed with the kids and thought they did very well.”

On the strength of a threepoint shot, Harris had five points in the first period to lead the Yellow Jackets while Faulkner and guard Jake Jones each had four more.

In the second period, Harris and Faulkner had 19 of their team’s 23 points with Faulkner scoring 10 points and Harris scoring nine more, including a three-pointer. Jones and guard Caden Schild also added baskets in that second quarter for the winners.

Faulkner had 10 of his team’s 13 points in the third period and notched eight more in the fourth before Layson began clearing the bench.

The team was back at it this week with some changes in their schedule because the football team is playing for the 5A state championship Saturday.

They went to Chattooga as scheduled Tuesday night (details were not available at press time), but instead of

playing Friday and Saturday night, they were back on the home floor Wednesday, Dec. 8 to play Paulding County. And Friday night’s game at Darlington in Rome is currently in limbo with Layson saying they will get the game rescheduled and when and where would be announced later.

So instead of three games in five days and back-to-back games Friday and Saturday, they have two-games-in-twodays with a trip to Chattooga Tuesday night and then theri second home game of the year Wednesday night against Paulding County.

“We are looking forward to seeing how we are coming along,” Layson said of this week’s contests just 24 hours apart. “I want to see us continue to improve with what we’re doing on defense and I want to see a couple of more guys step up in the scoring department. And I want to see us continue to compete. Compete as hard as we can. But I think overall, we have taken a couple of very good first steps in a lot of areas.”