Dresden wins look good enough

Posted: Friday, December 21, 2012 12:00 pm

By RANDY CAVIN
Press Sports
Dresden got two wins Tuesday night, but they were not pretty, in a District 13A sweep over Clarksburg.
The Lady Lions defeated the Lady Rockets 50-29 despite turning the ball over 22 times, hitting 40 percent of their shots and giving the Lady Rockets 33 attempts at the free throw line.
The Lions beat the Rockets 70-59 in the nightcap, but early foul trouble in the first by the Lions kept the Rockets in the game during the first half.
DHS 50, C’sburg 29 (G)
A win is a win no matter how you look at it, but assistant head coach Chuck West was not too pleased with the performance of the Lady Lions Tuesday night.
West was manning the helm while head coach Jonathan West was at home nursing the flu.
“The best thing I can say about it is we won the game,” West said. “It was a win, but we have a lot of work to continue to do.”
The Lady Lions (7-2, 4-2) might not have looked very sharp to West, but they did shoot better than the Lady Rockets from the field. Clarksburg (2-10, 2-6) only made only four shots out of 29 field goal attempts for a mere shooting percentage of 14 percent.
“They made a bunch of free throws, and we kept putting them there (at the line) all night long,” West said. “Our defense would have looked good if not for all of the fouls called.”
Clarksburg made its first field goal with 2:59 remaining in the first half and managed to hang around by hitting 11-of-17 free throws. The Lady Rockets also helped out Dresden by committing 13 turnovers in the first half.
Dresden’s shooting was cold early in the first period and finally got on the track when Amy McAlpin hit a jump shot at the 5:24 mark. The Lady Lions went on to score nine straight points before their run was halted on a free throw by Kelsey Walker with 2:40 to play in the period. McAlpin scored six points during that run.  
McAlpin finished with a game-high 22 points, hitting three 3-pointers and going 5-of-6 from the free throw line.
Dresden led 24-13 at the half and opened up a 37-13 lead on Carrie Hatchel’s 3-pointer with one minute to play in the third. Bad shooting continued to haunt Clarksburg, going scoreless for a long stretch in the third and hitting just one field goal in the final period. The visitors also hit 10-of-16 shots from the line in the fourth frame.
Hatchel finished with 10 points for the Lady Lions, and Sarah Rickman led the Lady Rockets with 11 points.  
DHS 70, C’burg 59 (B)
The Lions (7-2, 5-2) started out slowly, much like the girls did in the first game, before they turned up the heat the second half with a 13-point run.
Dresden had problems getting shots to fall in the first half, missing 13 shots, but made up for it in the third period by making 9-of-12 shots from the field. Caleb Davidson got the 13-point run going on his basket with 1:50 left in the third period.
The Rockets (4-9, 3-5) ended the run on a layup by Tad Hayes with 7:08 to play in the game. The damage had already been done by then, however, with the Lions leading 58-41.
Foul trouble by the Lions was a major problem in the first half, especially in the first period. Brock Dilday picked up two quick fouls in the first period, and Kaleb Houston also got into some early foul trouble.
“We did not play well, and one of the reasons we did not play well was because we got in such foul trouble,” head coach Tommy Dilday said. “We need Brock on the floor along with Kaleb Houston and Kourtney Sawyer. Brock got two fouls within the first two and a half minutes of the game and sits the rest of the half.
“Kaleb was kind of toting us in that time and playing really well. We just did not get him the ball enough. and then he got into foul trouble with his third foul.”
Nevertheless, Dilday said he was proud of the way his guys hung in considering the trouble his group has had lately with scoring. Dilday also felt good about the minutes his players got coming off the bench.
That one good quarter was the third as the Lions outscored the Rockets 21-10. Austin Maxey scored eight of his team-high 22 points in the third period with six coming off of a pair of 3-pointers.
Davidson scored 19 points for the Lions, and Houston scored 18 as he hit 6-of-6 from the line.
Hayes scored the game-high with 23 points for Clarksburg.
Dresden will back in action tonight when they play host to Bruceton in a make-up game that was postponed on Nov. 27 due to several players just finishing up the football season. Published in The WCP 12.20.12