Gallery by Heather Belcher
Charleston – Heading into Thursday’s Class A semifinal against Tucker County, Greater Beckley was at a size disadvantage.
The Crusaders decided to flip the table and use that to their advantage.
Greater Beckley generated 13 turnovers, scoring 19 points off of them to down the Mountain Lions 48-40 at the Charleston Coliseum and Convention Center.
With the win the Crusaders advance to the Class A state championship game for the first time in school history where they’ll play the winner of Thursday evening’s James Monroe-St. Joe matchup on Saturday at 10 a.m.
Often reliant on their ability to shoot the lights out from downtown, the Crusaders took just 11 3s, making five of them. Their bread and butter came from their ability to maximize turnovers and get downhill, using the speed of guards John Rose, Kaden Smallwood and Kendrick Wilson to score at the rim.
“We have a lot of paint points typically because our guards penetrate into the paint so well and they can finish so well,” Greater Beckley coach Justin Arvon said. “I think looking back, and I’ll watch the film here in a little bit, but maybe we should’ve had a few more trips to the foul line and things like that that could’ve helped out. But not a lot of fouls called today – they were letting kids play but we’ve got to be able to finish at the rim and we did okay in the paint today, but we can do a lot better.”
Early the Crusaders seemed destined to waltz to the title game after an early 6-0 lead ballooned to 11-2 following a Smallwood 3 and a Rose layup.
Instead a pair of layups in the half court from Tucker’s Trevan Bonner quelled the storm to end the first, though Greater Beckley still led 11-6. A jumper from Ashton Lycliter trimmed it to three but a pair of Wilson free throws and a Michael Judy 3 pushed it back to eight. But as they did throughout the game, the Mountain Lions settled in to match their foes blow for blow.
“The first round game I didn’t think we looked wide eyed,” Tucker head coach Daniel Helmick said. “I thought this moment was pretty big for them. This group is going to battle and they’ve put too much time in it to not to. We’ll get better from this. We got better from last year so we’ll get better from this also.”
After a 3 from Bonner and a layup from Levi Bennett trimmed the deficit to three, Wilson converted on a layup that sent the Crusaders into the break with a 20-15 advantage.
A large part of Greater Beckley’s success came from its ability to capitalize on the 10 first-half turnovers it generated, scoring 16 of its 20 points directly off of them.
“These kids can get out and run,” Arvon said. “And when we turn them over that’s a large part of our success. That just shows you, 19 points off of 13 turnovers, that’s a pretty good stat. If that 13 could’ve been 16 to 18, I mean that number’s not 19 anymore. We need that and our execution wasn’t here on the offensive end there today because Tucker County’s tough. They bump cutters, they block out well and make second shots. We’ve got to be able to execute in the half court but our transition points are huge for us.”
The teetering pace continued throughout the third with Greater Beckley twice leading by 10 but Tucker’s seven second-chance points kept it alive, trailing 39-31 heading to the fourth.
Slowly but surely the Mountain Lions kept chipping, cutting the deficit to four at 43-39 with 3:56 left.
A layup from Wilson helped push it back to six but the death blow came with 1:39 left in the game. After a missed basket, Greater Beckley’s Sean-David Kadjo tipped an offensive board back in to put the Crusaders up 47-40 and seal the game.
The rebound was just one of three Kadjo had on the afternoon, but the biggest by far.
“When it mattered Sean came up with an offensive rebound and putback,” Arvon said.
“It’s what he can do and I think come Saturday he understands he’s going to have to give the effort and intensity the entire game. When it mattered we made the plays.”
Wilson led Greater Beckley with 14 points while Smallwood scored 13. Lycliter led Tucker County with 14 points and 10 rebounds.
Here it is pic.twitter.com/No7gkw1apk
— Tyler Jackson (@TJack94) March 17, 2022
Email: tylerjackson@lootpress.com and follow on Twitter @tjack94
