After defeating St. Al 49-47 on Thursday, Manchester’s Mavericks fell in back-to-back games to Central Hinds and Hartfield to finish fourth in the conference tournament.
With the athletic, well-coached Central Hinds team looming in the semi-finals, Manchester Academy head basketball coach John Harris decided to slow the pace to a crawl, and it worked to perfection early.
“We stalled the ball with a four corners delay offense,” Harris said. “We wanted to get them out of a zone defense. We had to attack when it was there. We made them guard us. The key is making good decisions. We did a good job in the first half, but it fell apart in the second half.”
The slow play caused the scoring to be nearly nonexistent. Central Hinds held a 4-3 lead after one quarter.
The scoring picked up a bit in the second quarter. Central Hinds outscore Manchester 12-9 to take a 16-12 lead at the half.
In the second half, Central Hinds broke through Manchester’s defenses and put up 33 points in the second half. The Mavs were only able to score 18, but it wasn’t enough. Central Hinds won 49-30.
Matt Liddon and Hayes Bardwell each had nine points to lead the Mavericks.
In the consolation game, Manchester came face to face with Hartfield Academy.
According to Harris, scoring was once again the big problem with his team in the consolation game.
“The game against Hartfield was a battle,” Harris said. “We were right there. We just couldn’t get over the hump. They had some good guards. Hartfield is a good defensive team. Again, we could not score how we wanted.”
Hartfield was able to pull out a 48-37 win over the Mavericks.
Jay Warren led the Mavericks with 10 points.
Matt Liddon was right behind Warren with eight points.
