STATESBORO – The Bulloch Academy Gators took on the Mount de Sales Cavaliers at home on Friday night. The Lady Gators (5-2) dominated the Lady Cavaliers (0-6), 60-19, while the Gators (3-5) suffered a tough loss to the Cavaliers (3-3), 61-58.
In the girls varsity match, it was all gator; all night. Although they didn’t shoot well, the Lady Gators were able to force multiple turnovers which is where most of their points came from.
Bulloch Academy ran a long 1-2-2 press that Mt de Sales just couldn’t seem to break. They struggled a lot with getting the ball past half court and when they did, the Cavaliers just couldn’t finish. The Gators would grab the rebound, and move the ball down the court so fast, the Cavaliers didn’t have a chance to get back on defense.
The Lady Gators win was a full team effort. They were led by Emme Powell and Mckenna Furnari with 10 points each, followed by Rylie Ann Claxton and Kaley Cardell who added 9 of their own. Some other notable players were Zariah Major, Brynnley Ryan, Ashantay Noble and Maralyne Belcher who also contributed to the win.
Head coach Chandler Dennard said that his girls are where he expected them to be in this part of the season. With this young team comes a lot of growing pains, but as they prepare for next week they are trying to get better every practice and every game.
The boys varsity match was close the whole game. It took the Gators a little bit of time to get going, but it was slow on both sides with the score being 9-5 with the Cavaliers up at the end of the first.
By the end of the second quarter, the Gators had picked up some speed and had tied it up and 23-23 going into halftime. In the third quarter, both teams had almost doubled their points, and Bulloch Academy was up by two going into the fourth. Up 55-49 with three minutes to go in the fourth, the Gators allowed the Cavaliers to go on an 11-0 run with no answer which put mt de Sales up to win the matchup.
What killed the Gators by the end of the night were fouls. Overall, the team had 21 fouls on the night. In the fourth quarter alone, the Gators and 10 team fouls to the Cavaliers three. What seemed to cause those fouls were the Gators being outrebounded. The Gators struggled at the line shooting only 54 percent as a team while the Cavaliers were shooting almost 75 percent from the line.
The Gators were led by junior Jackson Sheppard, with 21 points. That was followed up by senior Will Ellis with 10 of his own and Shamar Jenkins, Ben Aaron, Brennan Perossa, Ike Hubbard, Reid Clifton and Keonte Mayner all contributing to the scoreboard.
The story of the night was Junior point guard Jackson Sheppard scoring his 1,000th career point Friday night. In the third quarter, Bulloch Academy called a timeout after a jump shot was made by Sheppard so that they could gift him a basketball with 1,000 points on it. Everyone in the gym, on both sides, gave him a standing ovation.
“I’m very happy for him. He’s worked his tail off and deserves every bit of it,” said head coach Zachary Brackett.
To Sheppard, this is one of the best accomplishments he has ever had, and he couldn’t have done it without the help of his teammates.
“This summer we’ve grinded, and we knew that I was close to it,” said Sheppard.
The Gators will be back in action next week with the girls varsity taking on Statesboro at Statesboro High at 6:00 p.m. on Monday, December 18, and the boys varsity taking on Southeast Bulloch on Tuesday, December 19, at home at 7:30 p.m.
