Trojan Men best Granite in county rematch
DRUMMOND – With five minutes remaining in the first quarter and the game tied 5-5, Granite Head Coach Dustin Keltner had his team pull the ball out and hold it. His ploy was not to slow the game, but to draw out the Drummond defense and try and out-quick the opposition.
But when the Trojan defenders finally extended, a Prospector turnover became a Jonah Parke slam dunk that led to an 8-0 run before the period’s end.
Drummond extended the lead from there to claim a 43-24 win over Granite, avenging their December loss in Philipsburg. “They’re seniors were very juiced for this game and it was just a matter of them maybe over-playing things a bit and us maybe getting a little swipe,” said Keltner of the strategy. “But Drummond stayed disciplined. They start four seniors and we start four sophomores and we hoped that if we extended the floor on them that we could use our quickness and those types of things. We were trying to get them to play a little man and they were disciplined.”
The Trojans played tough defense all night long, focusing on Prospector sophomore Kade Cutler. Cutler, who can dial it in from long range when he gets on a roll, had Drummond’s Luke Holland dogging him all night to keep him off balance. The tactic worked, as Cutler finished with just one bucket and a pair of free throws for four points on the night.
“We wanted Luke (Holland) to always know where Kade was,” said Trojan Head Coach Levi Parsons. “We didn’t necessarily want to face guard him, but we wanted we wanted him to know where he was all the time. We made a couple of defensive changes this week and we used them they did a really good job with it.”
Drummond’s balanced scoring attack was led by Parke with 12, followed closely by Holland and Riley Allen with 11 each.
Granite was unable to have anyone reach double figures on the night with Daniel Brabender getting a team-high of seven.
Granite takes to the snowy roads Friday night to play the Wildcats at Harrison-Willow Creek. Drummond will get one night off before hosting Twin Bridges Saturday evening.
SCORING
GRANITE – 5/8/7/4 – 24
DRUMMOND – 13/12/13/15 – 43
Granite – Parret 4, Ward 4, Tallon 3, PMetesh 2, Brabender 7, Cutler 4
Drummond – Pool 7, JParke 12, Holland 11, Huberg 2, Allen 11
