.jpg)
In Valley District action last week, the Rockbridge County High School boys basketball team earned its first road win of the season, defeating Turner Ashby 61-55 on Wednesday, before suffering a 62-44 home loss to William Monroe on Friday.
The Wildcats, who are 2-4 in the district, ended the week with an overall record of 2-13 after a 71-58 setback against Parry McCluer in Buena Vista on Saturday. (See separate story.)
Against Turner Ashby, the Wildcats got an impressive performance from senior guard Henry Lambert, who led all players with 27 points, sinking two 3-pointers and shooting 11-of-12 from the free throw line. Also stepping up for RC were Milo Mulitalo and Sam Ballstaedt with 12 points each, while Luke Eversole added eight points in his first game back from injury.
“We played well,” said RC head coach Rob Winfield. “It was a good team win.”
Leading TA, which ended the week at 5-10 overall and 0-6 in the district, was Jayden Lacey with 14 points, Solomon Shifflett with 13 points, and Owen Laver with nine.
WM 62, RC 44
Struggling to maintain the momentum after a strong first half, the Wildcats suffered a 62-44 home loss to new district rival William Monroe on Friday in Lexington.
The Wildcats weren’t able to contain junior guard Brady Lam, who led all scorers with 35 points, sinking five 3-pointers. Lam scored 20 points in the first half. Two days earlier, Lam had scored his 1,000th point in the Dragons’ 55-36 win over Harrisonburg.
“He’s a tough kid,” said Winfield of Lam. “I tried something different to start out defensively. The kid’s a good player. When you get going and sometimes you get some easy looks early, the basket starts to look big.”
Friday’s game was close early on, with WM (10-5 overall, 2-4 district) leading 11-10 midway through the first quarter, but the Dragons then went on a 9-0 run to go up 20-10, with Lam making two 3-pointers during that stretch.
WM took a 22-14 lead in the second quarter, but the Wildcats cut it to 22-19 after a 3-pointer from Zane Ramsey and a jump shot from Eversole. The Dragons held a small lead for the rest of the quarter and took a 29-25 lead into halftime.
Early in the second half, the Dragons built up a 10-point lead after Parker Hildebrand hit back-to-back 3-pointers to put the visitors up 35-25. WM continued to shoot well and stretched its lead to 53-35 by the end of the quarter.
Eversole hit a 3-pointer at the start of the fourth quarter, but Hildebrand responded with two triples, and the Dragons led comfortably the rest of the way.
For the game, WM was on fire from beyond the arc, making 12 3-pointers, while the Wildcats hit six treys.
Lambert and Ballsteadt led RC with 11 points each, with Ballstaedt making three 3-pointers. Mulitalo added eight points, Eversole chipped in seven points and took a charge, and Ramsey and Noah Hamm each made a 3-pointer. Lambert pulled down nine rebounds to lead RC, while Ramsey grabbed six boards and a steal, and Mulitalo had three rebounds and a steal.
Other than Lam, the Dragons’ leading scorers were Hildebrandt with 16 points, including five 3-pointers, and Timmy Guertin with 10 points.
RC committed 10 turnovers, while WM had eight.
Commenting on the Wildcats’ struggles offensively after playing well the first half, Winfield said, “It’s the story of our season. We can play with anybody, but sometimes we just rely on Henry and Milo to score.”
Winfield gave the Dragons credit for containing Lambert and forcing him to take tough shots under the basket or far away. “Teams are smart,” he said. “Henry got face-guarded. … We’ve got to work to get him shots. He’s got to work to get shots. We’ve got to be patient to get him looks.”
The Wildcats were scheduled to play host to Broadway last night and will continue district action at East Rockingham on Friday before playing host to Harrisonburg on Tuesday, starting with junior varsity action at 5:30 p.m. on both nights.
