JV:
The Manual JV boys’ basketball team controlled all 4 quarters of their Tuesday night game where they faced off against the Holy Cross Cougars. The Crimsons won 71-17.
The Crimsons won the tipoff to start the game. They dribbled down the court, where they then lost the ball. The first point of the game was made by Manual’s Deshawn McGee (#23, 10). After that point, the Crimsons seemed to be on a roll and Xavier Cosby (#5, 10) of Manual had several blocks.
Cosby then got an interception and threw the ball to Manual’s Ahmad Shelton (#11, 10), who was fouled and made the free throw for a 19-4 point lead at the end of the first quarter.
Starting off the 2nd quarter, the Crimsons immediately got fouled and Shelton stepped up for the free throw, making one out of two of them.
Cosby blocked a shot by the Cougars, stole the ball and hastily dribbled it down the court. Holy Cross hit Cosby’s shot out of bounds, where he also got the foul. Cosby made the two free throws for Manual and when a timeout was called, the Crimsons remained up 28-7.
With several minutes of great defense by the Manual Crimsons, Manual’s Geoffrey Njogu (#4, 10) had a steal and threw it to McGee. McGee drew the foul and made two free throws for the Crimsons.
The Crimsons were once again on a scoring streak, where they had multiple three-pointers and stole the ball from the Cougars multiple times. This led to a Manual lead of 43-9 at the arrival of halftime.
The Crimsons came back on the court for the 2nd half ready to finish the game. The Crimsons started off the third quarter with three-pointers by Cosby.
The third quarter showed the Crimson’s steel defense with more blocks on Holy Cross, including on the Cougar’s Jerek Hoover (#5, 9). At one point, Mark Woods (#15,10) for Manual stole the ball from Holy Cross and dribbled down the court where he then made a layup.
Manual had several three-point attempts and most were denied by the Cougar’s defense, except for Manual’s Corey Chapman (#3, 10). Chapman’s points sealed the Crimsons with a leading score of 58-12 going into the last quarter of the game.
At the start of the final quarter, Manual fouled Holy Cross giving them the ball first and scored for the Cougars.
Once Manual got the ball back, there were multiple layups made by Trenton Claypool (#1, 11) and Michael Gilbert (#13, 10) and a rebound by Kyrell Tagaloa Sickles (#21, 10). Tagaloa Sickles also made several free throws after being fouled by the Cougars.
With a last-ditch effort for some points, Holy Cross’s Asher Clark (#32, 9) made a three-pointer. The Cougars attempted to rack up some points on the board but were denied by Manual’s Claypool with multiple blocks and Tagaloa Sickles with a steal and layup.
In the end, the Manual Crimsons came out on top with a score of 71-17 against the Holy Cross Cougars. Their next game is at home on February 5th at 6:15 p.m. against Fern Creek.
Varsity:
The Manual boys’ varsity basketball team defeated Holy Cross High School Tuesday night with a score of 70- 35.
Starting off with strong defense, the Crimsons scored within minutes. Darin Wells (#2, 12) scored the most points in the first quarter, the total being 11. The team kept up the menacing pace and got various rebounds. Therefore, by the end of the first quarter Manual had a significant lead of 27-9.
The second quarter was consistent with points with 22 being scored. Justice Decker (#1, 11) was the main shooter in the second quarter. Manual blew past Holy Cross’ defense to keep up their lead.
“I feel good about it, man. We took our pride and defense today and we need to get back to that for the whole season,” Decker said.
The second half began with the Crimson’s notable lead, 49-17. This lead stayed consistent throughout the entire game, as well as the strong defense.
“They came out and followed the game plan. We really wanted to focus on how we played defense tonight, how we rebound the ball and it started from the jump,” Head Coach Miquel Coleman said.
Though the third quarter started off a bit slow, the Crimsons worked together to make the score 61-27.
“We do a great job of moving the ball. We have good sets, man. But some nights, unlike tonight, we don’t play good defense,” Coleman said.
The Crimsons finished off the game scoring nine points and Holy Cross scoring eight. This was the closest amount of points scored out of all the quarters. However, Holy Cross could not keep up and Manual took the win.
“They’re overperforming, outperforming everybody else’s expectations,” Coleman said.
The next boys varsity game will be an away game. It will take place at Seneca High School at 7:30 p.m.
