Cardington’s Warren Garrison goes up for a basket in his team’s Friday night win over Fredericktown.
Rob Hamilton | Morrow County Sentinel
A dominating second-half performance by Cardington carried their boys’ basketball team to a 73-50 win over visiting Fredericktown on Friday.
The Pirates, who improved to 4-0, 2-0 in KMAC play, with the win, only held a 31-30 lead at the half, but dominated the third quarter to open up 13-point lead, which they continued to add to during the final eight minutes of action.
“Hats off to Fredericktown,” said Cardington coach Jason Rice. “They competed, they played hard, they did everything. I told the boys that was the most physical, most athletic team we’ve faced so far. We just told the boys to stay disciplined and keep doing the good habits. I thought we got in bad habits early in the first half, trying to reach and trying to hit that knockout punch right at the beginning and not boxing out. That was the key in the second half. We were going to sit down defensively, keep their guards out of the paint, finish possessions with rebound and then we can go.”
Cardington got out to a fast start in the game, getting two three-pointers from Warren Garrison and one by A.J. Hall to hold an early 9-2 lead. Fredericktown would chip away at the lead until they tied the score at 16 late in the period, but a four-point play by Hall and a free throw from Merek McClure allowed the Pirates to hold a 21-18 advantage after eight minutes.
Two points each from Hall, A.J. Brehm and Garrison gave Cardington a seven-point lead at 27-20, but the team struggled to score down the stretch in the second quarter and only held a one-point advantage going into the locker room.
“The first half, I told our assistant coaches it felt like an NBA game,” said Rice. “There’s not much defense, a lot of offense happening. I thought we shot well, but could have finished around the rim a lot better. I though we left about 20-30 points around the rim we missed. Really happy with free throw shooting and really our mid-range and three-point shooting.”
Cardington’s defense came up big in the third quarter. After a Freddie basket gave them a 32-31 lead, the Pirates held them to only two points in a five-minute stretch, as they went on a 16-2 run sparked by nine points from Brehm.
The team opened up a 51-38 lead going into the fourth. After Fredericktown got within 11 at 55-44 with 6:16 left in regulation, Cardington iced the game with another long run — this one of 11 straight points. Bream tallied five during that stretch, while Hall hit a three-pointer that made it 66-44 with 2:57 to play in a game the home Pirates would win by 23.
After struggling to earn wins last year, Rice noted that his team has put in a lot of hard work to get better at closing out games.
“It’s been a lot of practice in the offseason, a lot of summer shootouts, a lot of summer camps and tough scrimmages that prepared us,” he said. “It’s been a big thing of just finishing games all season. I thought we were in a lot of games last year going into the fourth quarter that we just didn’t finish. We knew this game was coming where they would challenge us and I was proud of the way the boys responded. I hope they just keep being confident and keep playing hard.”
Bream tallied 26 points to lead Cardington, Hall added 19 and Garrison finished with 17.
Rob Hamilton can be reached at 419-946-3010, ext. 1807. Connect with him on Twitter at @SportsMCS
