By HARVEY SIMPSON
Dispatch Sports Editor
SHELLMAN — There’s joy in Wildcat Country today — Crisp Academy’s boys have ended a 13-game victory drought!
Facing a Randolph Southern team that had beaten them 43-36 earlier in the season, coach Drew Bailey’s Wildcats eked out a 45-42 win that came in their regular season finale.
That outcome completed a sweep for the visiting squads as coach Cliff Ranew’s Lady Wildcats followed up their previous 78-15 rout of the Lady Patriots with another easy triumph, 64-30.
Both Crisp teams will now begin Region 3-A GISA tournament play at Pinehurst. The fourth-seeded Wildcats have a 7 p.m. Tuesday play-in duel with Randolph. The Lady Wildcats are idle until 4 p.m. Thursday when they tackle Fullington.
Wildcats 45, Patriots 42
“I’m extremely proud of my basketball team,” a jubilant Bailey said after watching the ’Cats win for only a fourth time in 22 starts. “This was the hardest we’ve played all year, especially on defense where we got the job done for all four quarters.
“We had guys diving on the floor for loose balls, going hard for rebounds and really just showing a lot of intensity in all phases of the game. It was equally important, too, that we hung in their and weathered the challenge any time Randolph Southern made a run at us after we had taken the lead.”
Crisp, which saw its 10-9 first period edge turn into a 20-14 halftime deficit, used a 17-9 third period advantage to go on top 31-29 heading into the final turn where the game continued to be a nick-and-tuck affair right up to the final buzzer.
“When we handled their press and hit some key shots the way we did in the fourth quarter, that showed me our guys really wanted to win and I’m so glad they did,” Bailey said.
“We did a much better job of taking care of the basketball as whenever they kept changing their press from diamond to man-for-man our guys made adjustments on the fly and didn’t let it affect us.
“Now we’ve got to do it all over again when we face them on Tuesday in the game that matters most. It’ll really be interesting to see how our young team handles success.”
Nick Culpepper connected for 14 points and James Bodrey sank 12 in emerging as Crisp’s top two scorers. Kevin Melton led the Patriots with 14.
Score by Quarters
Crisp Academy 10-4-17-14 — 45
Randolph Southern 9-11-9-13 — 42
Scoring
Crisp Academy (45) — James Bodrey 13, Brett Card 7, Austin Childs 5, Justin Howard, Chris Wells, Chip Posey, Nick Culpepper 14, Michael Spears 6, Jay Lovell.
Team totals: field goals 15; free throws 8 of 14 (57.1%); fouls 17; 3-pointers — Bodrey 3, Culpepper 3, Card 1; fouled out — none.
Randolph Southern (42) — Loy DeVane 11, Kevin Melton 14, Brian Beard 2, Jon Floyd 7, Michael Ledford 2, Matthew West 4.
Team totals: field goals 18; free throws 4 of 15 (26.7%); fouls 15; 3-pointers — Melton 2, Floyd 4; fouled out — Melton.
Lady ’Cats 64, Lady Pats 30
In easily bettering their report card to 17-8 and moving to within a win of equaling last year’s victory total that stands as the best since the 2003-04 team went 22-5, the Lady Wildcats wasted little time in taking control of things.
By the time the first period was over, they held a 13-point, 19-6 advantage. At intermission, they were up by 12 at 30-18. Entering the backstretch, they were out front 45-24 and ended up with their eighth largest victory margin of the season to date.
“We came out and played really well and then after kind of going to sleep in the second period woke back up and played good basketball again the entire second half,” Ranew said.
“We took the opportunity to mix up some things on both offense and defense in an effort to try and get better before we begin region tournament play. We pressed a little the second half and that worked well plus we did a better job of rebounding which is something we need to continue focusing on.”
Crisp also shot reasonably well, landing the trio of Madi Mitchell, Kristen Greene and Ashley Athon in double digits. The first two hit 18 points apiece. The latter wound up with 10. No Lady Patriot had more than eight points.
Score by Quarters
Crisp Academy 19-11-15-19 — 64
Randolph Southern 6-12-6-6 — 30
Scoring
Crisp Academy (64) — Kristen Greene 18, Brittany Brewer 1, Cara White 2, Kendall Wilson 6, Ashley Athon 10, Madi Mitchell 18, Hannah Helms 3, Libbi Collins 6, Tomijo Carpenter, Kayla Childers.
Team totals: field goals 26; free throws 9 of 19 (47.4%); fouls 12; 3-pointers — Greene 3; fouled out — none.
Randolph Southern (30) — Crystal McDaniel 2, Lindsey Whatley 6, Gabe Jackson 8, Amber Boyett 7, Parker Rigsby 2, Madison Reagan 5.
Team totals: field goals 12; free throws 6 of 10 (60%); fouls 14; 3-pointers — none; fouled out — none.
