The Cleveland Daily Banner Sunday, January 10, 2016 | Page 28

28—Cleveland Daily Banner—Sunday, January 10, 2016

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Mustangs
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with eight points evenly split with
four from the floor and four more
from the free-throw line.
“The second half, they kind of
got away from us a little bit and
scored quite a bit, “ Cretton said
of the short run by Soddy-Daisy
in the third quarter. “But we were
pleased with the overall effort. A
lot of kids scored.”
Cycy White played really well
and Haley Jones is coming
around. She is just a sophomore.
We kind of challenged her to play
more physical and she has done
that. We're looking forward to getting better and tournament time.”
Cretton said he feels the Lady
Mustangs are finding their footing
just in time for a big week of basketball on the horizon. The Lady
Mustangs host Crossville Monday
then travel to an always tough
venue at McMinn Central before
returning to “The Stable” to close
out the week with East Hamilton.
“I hope we are (picking up
steam). All year we have been very
inconsistent. We’'re just trying to
get them to play hard. We have
great quarters and then we’ll go
into a lull and we can’t throw it in
the ocean. But, I’m sure there are
a lot of people like that. We are
just trying to get better, it was a
nice win, no question,” said
Cretton.”
“We have a very busy week next
week. We're loaded. We play
Monday, Tuesday and Friday with
Crossville coming here. They are
very good. We have to go to
McMinn Central. That’s a tough
place to play. You can go with
good teams over there and come
away with a loss. They are rough.
They take it seriously. They are
going to come after us with fullcourt presses. Hopefully, we can
take care of that pressure. Then
we have a big game with East
Hamilton at home Friday. That
will be huge. We've been watching
a lot of tape on them and they do
a good job. They play hard.”

MUSTANGS 60,
TROJANS 39

Points were a tough commodity
to come by for both the Mustangs
and Trojans in the first quarter of
the boys battle in Friday night’s
closer. Zach Eslinger scored the
only field goal for the Mustangs
two minutes into the contest. The
other five Walker Valley points
came from the free-throw line.
The Trojans fared no better managing only six opening-quarter
points thanks mainly to a
superlative effort defensively from
the Mustangs.
“The shots weren’t falling early,
but what I liked was we were so
aggressive on defense. We weren’t
giving up anything. That's what
we talked about after the game
tonight. We had a tough game
Wednesday, and that wasn't us,”
said a pleased Mustangs coach
Bob Williams after the Mustangs
recovered nicely from the midweek road loss to Baylor. “Tonight
we played more like we are capable of playing as far as on the
defensive end.”
“That’s what we've got to have.
We’ve got to have the guys play
defense. We’ve got to be aggressive and that's what we were looking for tonight.”
The Mustangs (8-8, 3-2
Disrtrict 5-3A) didn't fare as well
from 3-point range as did the
Lady Mustangs in the first game
of the night scoring only four
times from long distance. But the
3-ball was not needed for the
most part as solid inside offense
combined with the combative
Walker Valley defensive served the
Mustangs well.
Josh Jones led Wal ker Valley
with 16 points followed by Kolten
Gibson with 10. Nine other
Mustangs put points on the board
with the entire roster getting into
the action.
Nathan Zakkas opened the 21point second quarter for Walker
Valley with a 3 that put the
Mustangs back out front 10-8
after trailing 8-7. Soddy-Daisy (88, 1-3) responded with a sevenpoint run that put the Trojans on
top 15-10. The outburst was halted by seven straight points from
Walker Valley highlighted by a
Kenny Bunton 3-pointer to give
the lead back to Walker Valley 1715. The back-and-forth tussle
continued for some three minutes
before a pair of Cooper Melton
free throws with 1:05 left in the
first half gave the Mustangs a 2220 lead they would not relinquish.
Cooper's tosses combined with
points from Jones and Kenny
Bunton put the Mustangs out
front 28-20 at the half. Bunton
put the exclamation point on the
eight-point run with a rim-rattling
slam dunk with 37 seconds left
on the clock.
“I thought the guys played good
team basketball, sharing the basketball and finding open people.
This is still a work in progress.
We’re still trying to build and be

playing our best basketball in
February,” said Williams.
The third quarter was all
Walker Valley offensively defensively. The Mustangs continued
to pound the paint on the offensive end of the court with 17
points while beating the boards
on defense and holding SoddyDaisy to only eight points. Walker
Valley closed the quarter with
another run, this time of seven
points to head into the final eight
minutes with a 45-28 advantage.
“They (Soddy-Daisy) play hard.
Their coach does a good job with
them. I think the difference was
our aggressiveness. We had guys
making hustle plays. That’s what
we didn't have Wednesday. That's
how you have to play, aggressive,”
Williams stated.

Sitting on a comfortable 17point lead, the Mustangs opened
the fourth quarter with yet another run to open a 21-point gap just
over two minutes in. The next five
minutes saw the Walker Valley
boys held Soddy to nine points
the rest of the way to seal the victory.
“We have three next week. We
have Cumberland coming here
then we go to (McMinn) Central
then finish the week with East
Hamilton. We will be ready. No
choice,” said Williams, looking
toward a tough three-game
stretch. “The big layoff over the
break was tough for us, but we’ll
play ourselves back into basketball mode. I think we’ll be alright.
Tonight was what I wanted to see,
the defensive side especially. If we

can play defense line that can get
after people, I think we’ll be
alright.”
LADY MUSTANGS 67, LADY TROJANS 51
Soddy-Daisy
4 11 12 24 — 51
Walker Valley
15 15 18 19 — 67
Soddy-Daisy (51) — M. Hopkins 16, S. Ghaffari 14, Phillips
8, Bryant 4, Tremiar 3, Woodward 3, Williams 3.
Walker Valley (67) — Cycy White 12, Haley Jones 12, Lay 9,
Walker 9, Clark 6, Lay 6, Alomar 6, Anderson 5, Spann 2,
Davis.
3-point goals: Soddy-Daisy 5 (Phippips 2, Ghaffari,
Woodward Williams); Walker Valley 11 (Walker 3, White 2,
Clark 2, Lay 2, Alomar 2).
Free throws: Soddy-Daisy 14 of 22; Walker Valley 10 of 14.
Records: Soddy-Daisy 8-9, 1-3 District 5-3A; Walker Valley
7-9, 3-2.
MUSTANGS 60, TROJANS 39
Soddy-Daisy
6 14 8 11 — 39
Walker Valley
17 21 17 15 — 60
Soddy-Daisy (39) — Tre Carter 12, Spencer Kiylon 10, Burke
5, Rogers 3, Flippo 3, Kennie 3, Sulan 2, Perez, Humphreys,
Davis.
Walker Valley (60) — Josh Jones 16, Kolten Gibson 10,
Zakkas 8, Melton 8, Bunton 7, Eslinger 5, Nunnelly 3, Murphy
2, Hambright 1, Rathburn, Westfield, Swafford.
3-point goals: Soddy-Daisy 1 (Kearney); Walker Valley 4
(Zakkas, Nunnelly, Jones, Bunton).
Free throws: Soddy-Daisy 20 of 30 ; Walker Valley 12 of 24.
Records: Soddy-Daisy 8-8, 1-3 District 5-3A; Walker Valley
8-8, 3-2.

Banner photo, LYNNAE ROBERTS

WALKER VALLEY SENIOR GUARD Kat Alomar brings the ball
down court in the first half as referee Stacy Rymer, left, counts down
the 10-seconds to half court and Lady Mustangs coach Paul Cretton,
rear, looks on Friday at Walker Valley.