Second-half defense made the difference for the Greeneville boys on Friday night as they took down Cherokee 60-48 in District 2-3A action.
“This is a good win for us, getting a win in the conference is good,” Greeneville coach Brad Woolsey said. “I felt like in the first half we just weren’t where we needed to be in terms of execution. But in the second half we turned things around.”
With the win Greeneville is now 2-1 in league play, and helped by Grainger’s win over Volunteer on Thursday the Devils sit in a tie for first place heading into the second rotation of league games.
“We’re in a tie for first now. We still felt like we had chance to get to first with a win at Volunteer, but now we are on equal footing. Every game is big because there are so few conference games. There is no room for error and we have to be good down the stretch,” Woolsey said.
Friday’s game went to the second half tied at 30-30, but as Greeneville made it more difficult for the Chiefs to score things began to shift.
Parker Quillen started the third quarter with a long two-pointer from the corner and Taren Claridy quickly followed by getting loose in transition.
At the midway point in the period Zy Neal buckled his defender with a crossover and drained a trey from the elbow. Then before Cherokee could get a shot off Neal forced a turnover that went to Claridy who set up Yordan Mills for three-points the hard way. That put the Devils in front 42-35.
In the final 15 seconds of the third quarter Ryan Maggert and Quillen each hit from behind the arc to give Greeneville a 50-39 lead.
The Devils only allowed three field goals in the third quarter and two of them were fast-break layups.
Greeneville’s biggest lead of the night came on the first possession of the fourth quarter when Braylen Kidwell converted a transition layup through contact and made his free toss for a 53-39 lead.
Cherokee answered with a pair of layups from Elijah Carmack and closed the gap to 53-44.
The Devils then began to lock down on defense and held the Chiefs scoreless for four minutes, really putting a damper on the comeback effort.
In the closing stretch Greeneville got four more points from Mills to seal the win.
In the second half Greeneville allowed just 18 points and did not allow Cherokee to make a three-pointer after they hit six deep shots in the first half.
“In the second half it was about stopping penetration,” Woolsey said. “We talked about it before the game, about keeping a hand on three-point shooters and limiting penetration, and in the second half we finally did that. I felt like Braylen Kidwell really led that. He kept his chest on their guards and really made a difference in the second half.”
Friday’s action started with a back-and-forth first quarter. Greeneville took its first lead at 7-6 on a breakaway dunk by Claridy. That lead was short lived and going the other way Cherokee’s Gavin Lawson sank a jumper from the short corner.
In the final 30 seconds Mills knocked down a pair of three-pointers and gave Greeneville an 18-15 lead.
Mills led Greeneville on Friday with 23 points.
“I think we are starting to understand where we need to look to get points,” Woolsey said. “Yordan has the ability to score inside and outside. Tonight he did a good job of knocking down threes. That was huge for us and we have to keep that going.”
Not much scoring happened early in the second quarter, but Greeneville’s lead grew to 23-15 with 4:50 left in the first half after Claridy grabbed an offensive rebound and setup Kidwell for a straight-away trey.
After Mills sank a pair of free throws with 1:59 on the clock Greeneville led 30-22. Cherokee then scored the final eight points of the first half with Carmack connecting from deep twice.
Carmack led Cherokee on Friday with 24 points.
