Two games into the boys basketball season Woodrow Wilson was undefeated and hopes were high.
Heading into their ninth game of the season Wednesday night, the Flying Eagles were still looking for their third win of the season.
Unfortunately for Beckley that task would not be an easy one.
Coming off a last-second heartbreaking loss at South Charleston Tuesday, Woodrow Wilson lined up against Class AAAA defending state champion, George Washington.
The night did not end well for Woodrow Wilson.
A 17-point first-half effort by all-stater Ben Nicol helped the Patriots race out to a 38-22 halftime lead on their way to a 63-46 win.
“Against a quality opponent, that is probably the best four quarters we have played on both ends of the floor. It was nothing real flashy, but I thought we were solid and fundamentally much better tonight,” George Washington head coach Rick Greene said. “It’s basketball and every now and then we got a little too fast, but I was really happy overall with the 32 minutes. Our shot selection was much better than it has been.”
Woodrow took the initial lead on a jumper from Elijah Redfern who paced Beckley with a game-high 28 points.
Nicol answered with a 3-ball before a jumper from Redfern put the Flying Eagles back in front at the 6:02 mark. It was the last lead of the night for the home team.
The Patriots ran off seven straight on two buckets from Nicol and a triple from Zane McCarty.
Things went from bad to worse for Woodrow to start the second quarter.
With his team leading 19-11 after the first quarter, Nicol kept his foot on the gas with a straight line drive for an easy layup.
“Ben can take it off the dribble, finish with his right or left (hand) and his passing is super,” Greene said. “We were really happy with him. When we were struggling in other games, he was maybe trying to do too much and take over by putting us on his back. I thought tonight he had a much better feel for the game. That was one of the brightest spots for us as a team tonight.”
Before Woodrow Wilson could score in the second period, the GW advantage ballooned to 15 points.
The biggest lead was 19 after Brendan Hoffman scored six straight late in the quarter. One score by Hoffman came off a turnover and the other thanks to an offesnive rebound.
Rebounding, as it has been through the losing streak, haunted Woodrow all night.
“Taran (Fitzpatrick) causes a lot of problems. He gets hands on balls, and I will have to look at the tape, but I thought we were pretty good rebounding both ends,” Greene said. “We have to do that. We are good basketball players, but we are not the quickest at times. If we can position right, we can be pretty good.”
“Rebounding is just wanting to get the ball. Throwing your body in there and being tough and hard-nosed,” Woodrow Wilson head coach Ron Kidd said. “Seems like every other team is more hard-nosed than what we are showing at this point. (GW) can shoot the ball and they will hurt you. They don’t make mistakes and beat themselves.”
Trailing by 16 at halftime, the Flying Eagles came out of the locker room hot. Back-to-back long balls from Redfern and Landyn Wolfe energized Beckley.
A steal and coast-to-coast drive by Wolfe on the next GW possession trimmed the lead to eight and Greene wanted a timeout.
“I told them at halftime that we had to go. Then we come out and leave two 3-point shooters open and we hadn’t done that. That is high school basketball, but that is unacceptable,” Greene said. “Those first three or four minutes are crucial and we gave them hope. They got it to eight, but we got away with it. We have done that before this year and not got away with it. That is one reason we have three losses. I was happy that we regrouped though.”
Out of the timeout, George Washington scored 12 consecutive points to crush Woodrow’s momentum.
“We were down big and cut it to eight, then we came down and thought we had an eight-point play instead of just grinding and doing the things that cut it to eight. That is just inexperience type stuff,” Kidd said.
Greene acknowledged that Woodrow faced a tough task playing on back-to-back nights.
“Credit to Woodrow. It was just a scheduling thing where we are running out of dates right now. It was a tough back-to-back and how it went last night makes it even tougher for them,” Greene said. “I know what they went through. A lot of respect for them, I just thought they ran out of gas.”
Kidd admitted Tuesday’s game was a factor, but refused to use that as an excuse.
“I saw some dead legs tonight. We played extremely hard last night, but for a team that is gearing up to play in a sectional or regional or a state tournament, you are going to play back-to-back games,” Kidd said. “Some kinda way you have to train your mind and your heart to gut it out the second night. Each and every game for us is a battle. I don’t think we gutted it out tonight like we did last night.”
Nicol led GW (8-3) with 20 points, while McCarty added 14 and Hoffman had 11. Wolfe scored eight points for Beckley (2-7).
Woodrow Wilson hosts Oak Hill Friday in a crucial sectional showdown.
GW: 19 19 17 8 – 63
WW: 11 11 14 8 – 44
George Washington
Zane McCarty 14, Brendan Hoffman 11, Taran Fitzpatrick 4, Landon Adkins 4, Ben Nicol 20, Hunter Castleberry 2, Isaac McCallister 8. Totals: 27 4-4 63.
Woodrow Wilson
Landyn Wolfe 8, Elijah Redfern 28, Brayden Hawthorne 3, Sam Peck 5, Caleb Gravely 2. Totals: 17 5-7 44.
3-pointers – GW: 5 (McCarty, Hoffman, Nicol 3). WW: 7 (Wolfe, Redfern 4, Hawthorne, Peck).