The Basketball Beat Goes On

The Basketball Beat was sounding loudly on Tuesday evening and almost all the local girls teams came out on top and were winners for at leat one more night.  The Grimsley girls are the area’s highest ranked team and they hit the 26-1 mark for the season after they stomped East Rowan at the Bob Sawyer Gym.  The WhirlieGirls ran away with the game, winning 61-26 and now they will host Charlotte Vance, 55-46 victors over West Forsyth, on Thursday night.

Just about all of our teams came out on top with the exception of Page and Southern Guilford.  It’s a sad way for the Page Pirates to go out, losing in round one of the playoffs after winning the Little Four tournament at the Greensboro Coliseum back in December.  Page lost last night to North Mecklenburg 71-52 and Southern got tripped up by Bunn, 59-34.

Northwest Guilford, High Point Central, Dudley, Northeast Guilford, Ragsdale, Southeast Guilford, Southwest Guilford, High Point Andrews, and Eastern Guilford all won their opening round games and will be in action again on Thursday.  Dudley will have a very tough second round game taking their 21-6 mark down to Burlington to take on the 22-3 Williams Bulldogs.

The boys second round rolls on this evening with 25-2 High Point Central hosting Central Cabarrus, Wilson Fike visits Dudley, Northeast travels to Burlington Williams, and Ragsdale could walk over to High Point Andrews if they wanted to.

The Tuesday night Basketball Beat found us at Grimsley and then as soon as the Whirlies had taken care of business it was on over to Greensboro College to watch the Pride men in their first round game of the USA South conference tournament.  The Pride women had disposed of Peace College in their tourney opener 84-79, but that game was complete before we got into Hanes Gymnasium.  Staci Humphrey always leads the Pride ladies in scoring and she had 38 in the win over the Peace Pacers.  A first at greensborosports.com and anywhere in Guilford County possibly, the Peace nickname, the Pacers in print.  Humphrey may well be the best women’s player in all of Greensboro women’s college hoops.

Back to that men’s game, the Pride took Shenandoah University for a ride winning 86-75 to go 20-6 on the season and they along with the Pride women move on to the second round of the tournament with the men facing N.C. Wesleyan and women taking on Christopher Newport.  Lynn Bright led the Greensboro men with 25 points and 11 rebounds and you have to see #30 for the Pride to really appreciate what this kid can do.

To me this kid is so strong and he often looks like a man among boys out on the Hanes Gym floor.  Bright can do it all and he will not be out-done by the opposing teams.  If I was choosing an All-City college team it would consist of Lynn Bright of Greensboro College, Ben Strong of Guilford College, Steven Rush of N.C. A&T, and Kyle Hines and Ricky Hickman of UNCG.

When you watch a game at Hanes Gym it looks like the players are going up and down on 50×15 instead of a 94×50 playing surface.  The court is tight and the players are moving faster than fast.  Greensboro College can really move and I need to credit Head Coach Bryan Galsuki for the great job he is doing at GC and while we’re at it, coach Jason Tuggle has done an outstanding job coaching the Pride women. 

A final shout-out from GC’s Hanes Gym on Tuesday night goes out to Lamont Watson for his slam-dunk coming off of a fine alley-oop pass late in the game as the Pride were finishing off the Shenandoah University Hornets.  Didn’t the GC Pride used to be the Hornets?  Just ask SID Bob Lowe and he will tell you, They Did.  Â