Wednesday, Feb. 01, 2012

Rams get defensive

Cleveland tops North in offensive struggle

What do you get when you pit two basketball teams against each other who pride themselves on their tough defense?

The riddle was answered Wednesday night at Cleveland High School when the Rams hosted the Panthers of North Johnston in a late season non-conference girls basketball contest - and that answer was not pretty.

The Rams defeated the Panthers by two touchdowns, 28-14, to move to 13-6 overall on the season.

The first quarter featured just two total made baskets, 14 combined turnovers and countless missed shots as the Rams (6-2 in the Eastern Carolina 3A Conference) led just 5-2 after the opening quarter.

"North (Johnston) just came in here and was real aggressive," Cleveland coach Chris Danehower said of the Panthers' defense. "It was just a scrappy kind of game. It will make us better."

Fortunately for the Rams, their shooting touch began warming up a bit thanks to converting some Panther turnovers into easy points. Alliyah Sands' four steals paved the way to get the Rams out of their shooting difficulties as her steals more often than not led to closer shots.

North Johnston was not so fortunate.

"We got the ball in the paint; missed the shot," lamented North Johnston coach Jay Poole. "Then outside, we didn't seem to be in rhythm tonight. It was just one of those nights...we were a little cold."

After Ashley Hinnant's three-point play tied the game early in the second quarter, Cleveland reeled off a 9-2 run that all but buried North.

Forced to play from behind, the Panthers looked for their shooters from the outside to connect but found little room to operate on the perimeter.

"I thought defensively, we did a really good job just adjusting to what they were trying to do; trying to get the ball to their shooters and spread us out a little bit," said Danehower of his guards' ability to stick with the Panthers' shooters. "So we did just a good job of doing exactly what we were asking of them to do which is pretty much our forte the whole year -- defensively."

North (11-7 overall, 5-4 Northern Carolina 2A) only connected on one of seven 3-pointers.

"We've got to put it behind us," said Poole of the team's final non-conference game of the regular season. "We've got to learn from it."

Cleveland's Monique Torres led all scorers with seven points on the night.