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Antlers open the season with a win
Published November 14, 2007
By I. Donnell Moore
Times Sports Writer
The Tivy Antlers basketball season has officially begun, and it couldn’t have started a better way — with a win.
The Antlers met up with the San Antonio Christian Lions to open the season, and were able to handle the feisty undersized team in a 82-57 rout.
With a plethora of youth and two sophomores in the their starting lineup, the Antlers jumped out to a quick lead — one which they would never relent. The team followed the leadership of senior Cole Lidiak to a 20-12 lead in the first quarter.
Lidiak, who didn’t spent much time on the hardwood last season, scored 13 of the Antlers’ 25 points in the first quarter to push their lead to 11, 25-14.
Head coach Brian Young said he was happy that Lidiak played so well.
“He really got us off to a good start,” Young said. “He helped to open up our offense and get us rolling.”
The senior finished with 19 points before fouling out in the fourth quarter.
With both teams lacking some essential players because of football season, sophomore Bobby Schreiner started at point guard for Tivy and handled hiself well, according to Young.
“Bobby played well enough and he made some mistakes,” Young said. “But those were just due to lack of knowledge. And I take some of the blame for that. I assume sometimes and I need to teach them what to do instead of assuming they know already.”
With few bodies to bring the ball up the floor, Jonathan Perry took some of the responsibilities and ushered Tivy into their offense.
Young said you go with what you have available.
“Perry is not a traditional point guard, but he can handle the ball well enough,” he said. “We don’t really have a traditional point guard, so we go with what we got. If you don’t have a quarterback in football, you put the ball in the hands of the running back. At least the ball is in the best available hands.”
The random shifts to point guard did little to bother the sophomore as Perry poured in 21 points in the game as well as help contain the Lions star Chris White. White had 16 points in the first half, but only made four of his 10 attempts.
The lack of size for the Lions did not help their cause either.
Ethan Welch, Phillip Thompson and Taylor Finley, who are all taller than 6-foot 4, made sure to dominate the inside game. Welch racked up 13 in the first half and finished with 17, Finley tossed in nine and the senior, Thompson chipped in 10 points.
Chris Zurcher added 19 points for San Antonio Christian.
“I really thought we did some things well offensively, but I also thought we rushed our shots, too.” Young said. “I was very pleased with the effort and offensive execution and we played as a team. But our one-on-one defense just doesn’t match up with Tivy standards.”
Posting 82 points in their first game of the season, Young said it was too early to determine what type of team he had, but he noted they needed to work on their defense.
“Overall we got the win, so we’re happy with that right now,” Young said. I hope it brings us some confidence because we have a tough game ahead of us.”
The team will face San Antonio San on Friday at 6:30 p.m.
“They’re always a tough team, but the gym they play in is so hot. We have to prepare for that,” Young said. “Every night we hope to improve on something and that is what we will do.”
Contact I. Donnell Moore at donnell.moore(at)dailytimes.com
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