Based on what we witnessed tonight on the Jerry Walters court, with the man himself in attendance, one might get the idea that basketball tryouts each year at Central High School must be a pretty tough ticket. The homestanding Falcons opened the Region 2-B playoffs as the number one seed and completely manhandled eighth-seeded Riverheads 99-59. The Falcons will now host number five seed Fort Defiance, which squeaked out a one-point win over Stuarts Draft in what was obviously quite a different kind of game.
In this one, played before a boisterous home crowd that pretty much sat on its hands during the girls game (a 46-27 win over Buckingham) the Falcons rolled out a deep 16-man roster and the severely under-sized and outnumbered Gladiators simply had no answer. You almost had the idea that competition was so tough that they probably have another 20 or 30 guys roaming the halls that couldn't make the cut.
Of course the starters for Central established a working margin, but as the game progressed, every time the student section would demand that one of their favorites take the floor, he would do so and produce immediately. As more and more guys came off the bench, the crowd grew louder and more demanding, and as you can see, they almost got to celebrate hitting the century mark.
That part actually came as sort of a surprise as the score was "only" 64-40 after three quarters and no one was thinking in those terms. In fact, somewhere along the line in the fourth quarter, the running clock should have kicked in, but it only did so for a very limited time in the final seconds.
If the Falcons had in fact hit triple digits, Riverheads might have helped it along because over the final few minutes, the Gladiators were downright determined to score as much as they could, so they kept jacking up threes and driving down the lane to draw fouls. Of course the outcome was no longer in doubt but the Big Red just wanted to go out on as positive a note as possible, especially the four seniors.
As usual, those four were the leading scorers with Henley Dunlap leading the way with 15, almost all scored in the second half. He was followed by 14 from J P Crawford, 9 from Jackson Brammer and 8 from Will Gardner. All four of them hit at least one triple and junior Grayson Ward added two of his own.
As for the Falcons, with that many players and that many points, how do you choose someone to mention? Based on what I know of their roster, I would have expected the biggest games to come from Luke Williams, Joseph Pan, and Dereck Batiz Lugo. Each of them cooperated and had a nice game, but I personally had never heard of Jonathan Akasa, and he was a one-man wrecking crew tonight, especially in the first half.
With the win, the Falcons will host the Indians on Thursday night. If I understand the format correctly, the team that wins that one punches a ticket to the state tournament. Of course we know what awaits there, so be careful what you wish for. But good luck to both teams anyway.
Riverheads finishes the season at 11-13 and will now turn its attention to baseball, which should look very promising again this year. I don't think RHS and Central are scheduled to meet in football again this fall, so maybe our trips up and down 81 are going to taper off a bit.
In this one, played before a boisterous home crowd that pretty much sat on its hands during the girls game (a 46-27 win over Buckingham) the Falcons rolled out a deep 16-man roster and the severely under-sized and outnumbered Gladiators simply had no answer. You almost had the idea that competition was so tough that they probably have another 20 or 30 guys roaming the halls that couldn't make the cut.
Of course the starters for Central established a working margin, but as the game progressed, every time the student section would demand that one of their favorites take the floor, he would do so and produce immediately. As more and more guys came off the bench, the crowd grew louder and more demanding, and as you can see, they almost got to celebrate hitting the century mark.
That part actually came as sort of a surprise as the score was "only" 64-40 after three quarters and no one was thinking in those terms. In fact, somewhere along the line in the fourth quarter, the running clock should have kicked in, but it only did so for a very limited time in the final seconds.
If the Falcons had in fact hit triple digits, Riverheads might have helped it along because over the final few minutes, the Gladiators were downright determined to score as much as they could, so they kept jacking up threes and driving down the lane to draw fouls. Of course the outcome was no longer in doubt but the Big Red just wanted to go out on as positive a note as possible, especially the four seniors.
As usual, those four were the leading scorers with Henley Dunlap leading the way with 15, almost all scored in the second half. He was followed by 14 from J P Crawford, 9 from Jackson Brammer and 8 from Will Gardner. All four of them hit at least one triple and junior Grayson Ward added two of his own.
As for the Falcons, with that many players and that many points, how do you choose someone to mention? Based on what I know of their roster, I would have expected the biggest games to come from Luke Williams, Joseph Pan, and Dereck Batiz Lugo. Each of them cooperated and had a nice game, but I personally had never heard of Jonathan Akasa, and he was a one-man wrecking crew tonight, especially in the first half.
With the win, the Falcons will host the Indians on Thursday night. If I understand the format correctly, the team that wins that one punches a ticket to the state tournament. Of course we know what awaits there, so be careful what you wish for. But good luck to both teams anyway.
Riverheads finishes the season at 11-13 and will now turn its attention to baseball, which should look very promising again this year. I don't think RHS and Central are scheduled to meet in football again this fall, so maybe our trips up and down 81 are going to taper off a bit.
