Boys Basketball Gains Win.

McCutcheon's defense locks down North Montgomery

By BARRY LEWIS • Journal Review • December 12, 2010
 

LINDEN -- McCutcheon coach Rick Peckingpaugh drew upon his past experiences and went into Saturday night's boys basketball game against North Montgomery with a plan which included a gimmick or two.

Using a triangle-and-two defense and a box-and-one the Mavericks (2-3) completely shut down North Montgomery's offense and scored a convincing 51-28 victory.

A night after North Montgomery's sharpshooters Jake Thomas and Andrew Airey combined for 43 points, the trick defenses shut them down. Airey was held scoreless, and Thomas hit one 3-pointer for three points.

"We came in with a game plan, and we executed it pretty much to perfection," Peckingpaugh said. "Those two kids burned us in the past, and we weren't going to let that happen again. (Troy) Ashley and (Austin) Price did a great job shutting those two kids down."

As a result the Chargers (3-2) were never able to get untracked offensively. After finding themselves down 16-4 at the end of the first quarter, the spread grew to 33-7 at halftime.

In that first half McCutcheon hit 57 percent of its shots (12 of 21), while the Chargers hit only 15 percent (3 of 20).

In addition the Mavericks outrebounded the Chargers 21-5, and North Montgomery was called for 10 fouls to none for McCutcheon. That disparity led to Chargers coach Joel Grindle picking up a technical late in the first half.

McCutcheon was able to stretch its lead to 40-9 before the Chargers started to whittle away making the final score a little more respectable.

"It was just one of those nights," Grindle said. "We never adjusted to their gimmick defense, and no matter what we drew up it didn't work tonight. I told the team we needed to learn form this and just move on."

McCutcheon's balanced offense was led by Brady Knoy with 11 points. Ashley and Clyde Greyer each added nine and Vince Hunsicker and Nathan Acree each tossed in seven points.

"We put it all together tonight," Peckingpaugh said. "Through our first four games, we always seemed to have a quarter here or a quarter there that killed us. Tonight we played four solid quarters on both ends of the floor."