Washington County Enterprise-Leader
Tiger Press Swarms Pioneers, 65-45
PRAIRIE GROVE LOOKING TO BUILD MOMENTUM
PRAIRIE GROVE — The Tigers used a swarming fullcourt press to jump all over the visiting Gentry Pioneers and pick up their third conference win of the boys basketball season on Friday.
Gentry (4-13, 0-9), had trouble inbounding the ball against Prairie Grove (5-15, 3-9) and the Tigers built a 28- 6 lead after the first quarter.
Jacob Storlie converted a 3-point play with a bucket in the paint and free throw to open the scoring.
Prairie Grove then scored 7 points in 20 seconds starting with J.D. Speed’s jumper with 6:15 remaining in the first. Ten seconds later Storlie put in an athletic over the shoulder reverse lay-in off a steal and added another 3-point play when Ty Tice stole another Pioneer inbounds pass and spun around to pass the ball back while hanging in the air as momentum carried him out of bounds.
Cooper Winters scored the next 3 Prairie Grove points to cap off a 14- 0 Tiger run. Brent Barker finally got Gentry on the scoreboard with a layup off a steal midway through the period but Prairie Grove didn’t let up on the throttle and outscored Gentry 164 the rest of the way to build a 22- point lead going into the second period.
“We’ve been struggling offensively and we wanted to create good opportunities for our offense through defense,” said Tigers’ coach Steve Edmiston. “This was one of the better halves we’ve played this year.”
In the third quarter Gentry matched Prairie Grove’s output with 17 points. After the Tigers upped their advantage to 56-21, on a Cooper Winters rebound and touchdown pass to Jacob Storlie racing downcourt, Gentry gradually reduced the deficit.
Dusty Haag, a 6- foot junior forward, went to work in the low post scoring 6 points. Prairie Grove got points from Leighton Smith, who slid along the baseline and received a pass resulting in a layup and Jon Halbert scored on a lead pass. Blake Boyd then knocked down a trio of 3- point shots for Gentry to trim the lead to 64-36 after three quarters.
“Blake Boyd is one of our sophomores, who has been showing us lately in practice and JV games that he can shoot the ball real well,” said Gentry coach Sean Price. “Tonight we put him in the starting lineup to give him a chance to show what he could do. He came out a lot more relaxed in the second half.”
Gentry worked an outside-inside play to start the fourth with Boyd
executing a bounce pass to Haag, who drew a foul and made both charity shots. By the end of the game. Gentry had whittled the lead down to 20 with Prairie Grove winning, 65-45.
“We’ve got two big games next week, we’re trying to gain any momentum we can,” Edmiston said. “We’re still working on it, if we’re going to do it, it’s time to do it.”