Vols beat rival Patriots on road
COLUMBUS – Foul trouble backed the Starkville Academy Volunteers into a corner on Thursday night and in a hostile environment against a rival like Heritage Academy, it was either going to make or break the team.
Instead of folding, coach Bill Ball’s squad went to work and it was the next man up. One of those was Cy Hallberg, who came off the bench in the first quarter when Randall Futral picked up two fouls and in the second half when star post man Jawon Yarbrough had four fouls.
Hallberg scored 13 points and was one of several players that stepped up when they were needed the most to grab a big district road win 55-43.
“I could not be more happy with our entire team,” Ball said. “I think you’re seeing us grow up. A young team would let adversity affect us and carry it to the other end of the floor. I think (Thursday) we just played. I think we got enough buckets in transition to keep the game from getting close.”
The Vols (13-3, 8-1) used a 16-3 run to close the first half to really take control of the game. It was a first half of runs with SA jumping out to a 13-6 lead and then surrendering a 9-0 run to the Patriots to trail 15-13 after one quarter.
As Heritage pushed that lead to 21-15 in the second quarter, Ball called a timeout to get his team back into focus. The Vols went to a 2-3 zone and started to get stops and in the final minutes of the half, they began to get it all rolling.
Starkville Academy scored eight-straight to take the lead with 1:30 left and finished the half with a 16-3 run overall to pull ahead 31-24. The game never got closer than five points the rest of the way.
“I think what happened was that we went to the zone to protect foul trouble and not only did we contest those threes, we forced enough turnovers and got transition buckets to help us get that run,” Ball said.
Yarbrough picked up three fouls in the third quarter alone and had four fouls for the entire fourth quarter. Still, the Vols were able to hold that lead and in the fourth, they took full control after leading 40-35.
Hallberg nailed a 3-pointer at the 5-minute mark to spark an 8-0 run that included backto-back buckets by Futral and it gave Starkville Academy its largest lead of the game at 48-36 with 4:18 left. The Patriots were held to just eight points in the final frame.
With the victory, the Vols can now clinch the division with a win against East Rankin Academy on Tuesday night. Both the Patriots and the Vols won a game against each other, but Starkville Academy lost by four points at home and won by 12 on the road giving them the tiebreaker.
Girls Game
Starkville Academy 24, Heritage Academy 20
With 10 seconds left in the game and clinging to a 2220 lead, the Lady Volunteers needed a big stop.
Defensive stops weren’t hard to come by for either team in the game, but Starkville Academy got the biggest one there as Lillee Alpe took a shove from a Lady Patriot and hit the ground to draw a charge. Alpe calmly knocked down two free throws and sent the Lady Vols home happy with a big rivalry win.
“Defensively they came out ready to fight,” Starkville Academy girls coach Marianne Ward said. “They knew what was at stake. The rivalry is very important here and they came out and said, ‘you got us on our court, now we’re going to get you on yours.’”
Alpe led the Lady Vols in scoring with nine points and Caroline Wood had eight as both teams had trouble to put points on the board. It was a narrow 10-9 lead for Starkville Academy n the first quarter and it didn’t allow a point until 5 minutes left in the second quarter. It wasn’t until 1 minute was left in the half that Heritage was able to get its first basket of the frame, but the Lady Vols didn’t take advantage to push the lead out and they held a 16-13 lead.
It was 20-19 after three quarters with Starkville Academy on top and it surrendered just one point in the last 8 minutes.
The win moved the Lady Vols to 7-9 overall and 3-6 in division play as they currently sit at fifth place in the district with a game to go.