Earlier I had mentioned that Riverheads was starting its basketball schedule on time this year as opposed to the usual routine of waiting until football players could join in the action. That meant that only seven players were scheduled to suit up tonight against a full Bath County squad. The potential problem that could have resulted for Riverheads would have been if someone were to get hurt or if players got into foul trouble. I have personally never witnessed one of those games where a team had to finish a game with a 5 on 3 disadvantage but it has been known to happen.
So when I walked into the game tonight and was told that one of the seven would not be playing after all, I really started to wonder......can we really beat this team with only 6 players suited up? Well as you can tell from the score above, that problem was solved, probably within the first minute of the game as one Gladiator, whom I will name here shortly, scored the first eight points of the game within the first minute of action and the Big Red went on to score the first 21 points of the contest before Bath finally scored.
The Gladiators never let their feet off the gas and in fact they held the Chargers completely scoreless in the fourth quarter. Bath by the way showed a printed roster of 14 but I only counted about 10 in attendance.
So how did that foul situation pan out you might be wondering? Well nobody ever fouled out but at the end of the game, two Gladiators had four fouls each, so you can do the math and figure out that we did come at least somewhat close to having to deal with that issue, but fortunately that was a one-time thing because by the time the Big Red takes the floor again, football will be over and we will have our full team available. Ironically the next opponent will again be Bath when Riverheads travels over the mountain next Wednesday night.
The Gladiators accomplished this surprisingly lopsided win tonight by employing a frantic run and gun offense, something we are not accustomed to seeing at Riverheads. They harassed the Chargers mercilessly on defense with quick hands and even quicker feet, which led to a number of breakaway lay-ups. But when they did set up in a half-court offense, they showed the fans that apparently this year's team is going to be in love with the three-pointer.
They made 12 of them tonight, with five out of the six players hitting at least one. Even the sixth guy tried his darnedest to join the party and overall I would conservatively estimate that the Big Red attempted 30 or more. The primary assassin, the guy I have already hinted at, was sophomore Will Gardner. When he hit his first attempt, nobody really knew that he was not going to be stopping anytime soon. He dropped in a second one soon after that, and added a two point basket as the scoreboard read Gardner 8, Bath 0 with less than a minute gone.
He finished the game with seven triples and an obvious career high of 31 points on the night. If he is able to keep up that kind of scoring pace, the Big Red will have its own Bowers/Irving/Veney this year, so maybe the Shenandoah will have another contender after all. However it is logical to assume that when the rest of the team comes on board, the play time and therefore the scoring will be more evenly distributed.
But on this night at least he put on a show and was supported by 15 points from Carter Mooneyham, 12 from Gabe Milo, 10 from Henley Dunlap, and 7 from Jackson Brammer, each of whom hit at least one triple. The totals tonight (12 from the team and Gardner's individual 7) were each one below the school record.
And if you like a different kind of excitement in your basketball, Mr. Mooneyham, who can't be more than 6 foot, tried his hand at the dunk tonight, not once but twice. His first flush was in fact successful and brought the house down until one of those mean men in the striped shirts took it away on a travel. His second attempt came up short because he left the floor a little too quick. But that will give Big Red fans something else to look forward to as the season progresses.
Obviously you can't read but so much into just one game, but tonight's opener certainly was more productive than the roster differential made it look like it might be. So hats off to Coach Weller for having his Iron Man Six ready to go. Ironically the JV game had a similar numbers issue but in reverse, as Riverheads had about 10 guys dressed out to only 7 or so for Bath. Riverheads won that one 36-14.
As mentioned the two teams will meet again in Bath one week from tonight. But next up for Riverheads is our annual trip to Salem on Saturday. Best to bundle up for that one, with a cloudy 40-ish kind of day in the forecast. And of course don't forget to order those tickets in advance. Good luck to the Big Red in that one.
