Tigers bury Rockets with 3-point blitz

Most basketball coaches teach defense first, and the coaches in the Little Rock Central Tigers’ 68-41 victory over the Little Catholic Rockets at Rocket Gymnasium on Friday night are no exceptions.

The only problem for Catholic Coach Todd Ezzi was that there aren’t many ways to stop 25-foot three-points shots, and Central’s backcourt poured them in from the start.

Central hit four three-pointers in its five attempts, including 3 from 22 to 25 feet by junior guard Henry Dudley. The only miss turned into a rebound layup by senior forward Raekwon Rogers.

Dudley’s third three-pointer gave Central a 14-2 lead with 4:32 left in the first quarter, and Ezzi called timeout.

“We talked about their shooters on our scouting report, but I don’t think we were ready for them to hit them at that range,” Ezzi said. “Before we knew it, they had us down big, and it’s hard to come back from that kind of hole.”

“That’s been our focus here lately,” Central Coach Oliver Fitzpatrick said. “Early in the year we were falling behind 15 or 20 points, so we’ve changed our focus to opening up with intensity early.”

Catholic trailed 23-9 at the end of the first quarter but worked its way back to within 34-23 at halftime.

“We talked about at halftime that the difference would be keeping them off the boards and out of the paint, but they just have so many athletes, it’s almost impossible to do that,” Ezzi said.

Central regained control in the second half and pulled away with a barrage of points from senior forward Cameron Johnson, sophomore guard Gregory Johnson, Rogers, and a three-pointer from senior guard Jacobia Platt II that gave Central a 45-23 lead with 5:13 left in the third quarter.

“For us, it has to begin with a defensive effort,” Fitzpatrick said. “I mean, for us, it’s a defensive game. It starts on the defensive end. We always have a specific number of points we want to allow. We got the kids buying into it, and we gave it a great defensive effort tonight.”

Catholic pulled within 49-31 on senior center Jack Mathis’ layup midway with 3:03 left in the third quarter, but Central responded with a 17-point run that started the mercy-rule clock in the fourth quarter.