BLACKSVILLE — Four double-digit scorers, 30 forced turnovers and a 33-point third-quarter effort were among the more impressive stats for No. 6 Trinity Christian on Jan. 12, as the Warriors pummeled host Clay-Battelle, 91-48.
“We got outplayed,” Cee-Bees head coach Josh Kisner said. “They are just a better basketball team than we are right now. That’s it.”
The Warriors smothered their opponent on the defensive end, wreaking havoc up and down the hardwood for the Clay-Battelle offense.
“Our shooting percentages looked good, but we only got half the shots we wanted to because we couldn’t get the ball down the floor,” Kisner said. “We had kids in the right places; we just weren’t being smart with our passes. That comes from inexperience with a lot of freshmen and sophomores.”
The Trinity defense was dominant from buzzer to buzzer, but particularly picked up in the third quarter. The Warriors switched up the press in an attempt to discombobulate the Cee-Bees’ offense, which began to settle into a rhythm during the latter part of the first half.
“We went into halftime, and I was upset we gave up 16 points in the second quarter,” Trinity head coach John Fowkes said. “We made adjustments to the press. We moved Briston (Bennett) in front of (Gunner) Brummage, and turned our full-court press into a three-quarter-court press, and [C-B] just didn’t respond to it very well.”
Junior Caleb Jenkins led the defensive charge for the Warriors, using his wingspan to clog passing lanes and forcing the Cee-Bees into bad passes.
“He worked his butt off tonight,” Fowkes said.
Another deciding factor in the contest was the rebounding effort from the Warriors, who spent the night cleaning the glass on both offense and defense.
Daniel “Woods was a monster today. He was on the boards and they couldn’t stop him,” Fowkes said. “That’s all my assistant coaches, man. They’ve been preaching to those kids in practice to get the offensive boards.”
It appeared that coming in on a two-game losing streak lit a fire under the Warriors, who turned in their most impressive performance of the year, topping their previous high-score by 14 points.
“We just played as a team in every aspect,” said junior Joel Robertson, who paced the Warriors with
17 points. “Everyone contributed; everyone just did what they needed to do to be a team.”
“Our kids, it’s a special group of kids,” Fowkes said. “They’re just ready. Those last two losses, they propelled us. Our week of practice was phenomenal.”
Trinity (7-2) travels to Cameron on Jan. 16 for a 7:30 p.m. tip-off. Clay-Battelle (2-5) also returns to action Jan. 16. The Cee-Bees visit Paden City for a 7:30 p.m. start.
