High School Basketball Saturday Morning rewind:Time for the FINAL Exam

We saw two good games at Dudley last night and in the girls game, that 68-51 final was much closer than that score indicates…Game was at 50-48, Dudley going into the fourth quarter and the Lady Panthers close out the game and seal the deal with their patented 18-3 run to finish off the game….

With the win the Dudley girls are now (4-0) in the Metro Conference, with wins over Smith, Southern Alamance, Southeast Guilford and now Western Guilford and the Lady Panthers will take that unbeaten conference mark over to the Mac Morris Gym and face the Unbeaten Page Pirates next Friday night…Page Pirate women (13-0) overall with Metro wins over Western, Grimsley, Smith and Southern Alamance….

Same story for the boys with Page at (4-0) Metro and Dudley at (4-0) Metro, with both clubs having defeated the same teams that the girls did…

This doubleheader with Page and Dudley, at Page next Friday night should make for the ‘Final Exam” in a week full of exams for the students next week on Monday-Thursday and then I believe the students are off from on Friday and they can come back and take their FINAL at the Mac Morris Gym that night….DUDLEY VS. PAGE and both girls and boys teams come in at (4-0) Metro 4-A….

Now back to last night and those Western Guilford girls got my attention last evening over at Dudley…Had not seen the Hornets play yet this season and to me they look to be a better team this year than they were last year when they still had Brittany Clency and Carnique Marks…

Western is very quick and they got very good productivity out of their top four players that we had been talking about so much on the way into that game last night…Karima Dean really went to work in the second half and especially in the 3rd period…Dean has good body control and she along with Ivana Davis really got the Hornets going in the second half…Western got good early help inside from Selena Lozada and she can play and she is very aggressive around the basket…Letrecia Smith was also a plus for Western and she was there to work out front with Davis and Dean in running the Hornet offense and Western ought to be able to beat some teams if they keep playing like they did last night….They play very quick and low to the floor, so they are hard to keep up with….WG hit some key layups and jumpers that could have been shots that could miss without the full focus needed to pull those off…Hornets need to keep that focus and you could tell these kids had been playing some Summer ball, based on what we saw last night, in comparison to last year….

Dudley girls can still run and lay out the pressure with the best teams around and they will get a chance to do that with Page next Friday night…..Mo Davis has become a very effective three-point shooter for the Panthers and it seemed like last year she was running the floor and offense more than she was taking that outside shot….This year she is taking and making that shot and she hit four key free throws down the stretch in the 4th quarter that helped jump-start Dudley on the way to their win over Western…Davis with 25 points on the night to lead all scorers….Essence Abraham seems to more of the point guard for Dudley this year, but they have at least three guards/wings that are handling the ball….Makala Rouse can also handle the ball for Dudley, but she still seems to be favoring that injured knee and she was hopping around at least a couple times on that bad knee last night and you can tell Rouse is still not back at full-strength….Akela Maize is such an imposing figure out there for Dudley at 6’5 most of the time she doesn’t even have to leave her feet to be a factor…She is one of those game-changers that our partner Dennis White likes to talk about….Maize could easliy be the central factor in the Dudley game at Page next Friday night…A girl that never takes a play or a night off is Kennedy Currie…Currie can get the stick-back in a hurry for Dudley…She uses the board/glass so well and it is usually a quick touch off of the board for her twos from the side of the basket and Kennedy Currie is very, very active around the basket….

Should be a very good one with Dudley at Page next Friday night….

Boys side from last night should the game was not as close as the score indicated…The game was at 8-7 Dudley in the first quarter and then the Panthers went on a 14-2 run to close the quarter and that was the difference…Dudley by three points in the second period, by two in the third and five in the 4th…Close game other than that 14-2 run and with that Dudley put this game out of reach….Devan Gregory was on FIRE early and Sam Hunt with his 10 assists was setting everybody up and getting his teammates involved in the offense on the break and in the half court offense…Khalil Vance should us game and it was good with very good body control, almost like the body control we saw from WG’s Karima Dean in the girl’s game…Vance gives Dudley some good inside and perimeter help and along side Yau Shol down low, along the blocks, Dudley does not have to be real big, they are just real quick with hands, arms and bodies flying around all over the place….Gregory has the smooth offense, Hunt has kind of changed his game like Paris Kea of Page did last year and Sam is now more of a facilitator, but he can still score if necessary….

Emmanuel Mosley gives Dudley a big boost off of the bench and BJ Pittman is another guard that means a lot to the Dudley offense…So much of what Mosley does comes on the defensive end…Dudley has kids that understand and are willing to learn the game from new coach Brian Seagraves and his staff and from talking to Khalil Vance, Devan Gregory, Yau Shol and Sam Hunt last night, the Panther men are looking to win that Mertro 4-A this year and they are willing to what it takes to win it….

For the Western men, the plus-side goes to Austin Lewis from last night…Lewis seemed to be the Hornet, that had his game from start to finish and the other Hornets seemed to be a little off their game last night and I’m sure Dudley had something to do with that…

More to come for sure, as always, as the day unfolds…

4 thoughts on “High School Basketball Saturday Morning rewind:Time for the FINAL Exam

  1. The thing I learned last night is that GDS can play with Wesleyan and HPC. I wasn’t positive. But they were as good as I have seen them in a few years last night. And that was without the services of Reggie Dillard the majority of the game (illness and injury). They crushed a team that played Wesleyan close throughout and lost by 12. They guarded and they finally made some shots. And maybe one of these days people will start seeing how good JT Terry is. He was a monster again last night. I have never seen a kid his size rebound like he does. I don’t know that I have ever seen a 6’1 kid dominate the glass the way he does. I am looking forward to Friday night. Hopefully they take care of business in Charlotte on Tuesday against Clemson signee Patrick Rooks and Charlotte Christian.

  2. Should be a good game Friday Night. Wesleyan lost to Lone Peak (#3 in nation) 63-59 in the Brandon Jennings Invitational

  3. Wow!! They are good. No doubt Wesleyan has the best collection of talent in the state. I don’t think a sane person could say otherwise. Question will be what team will show up. And if it is close can they execute well enough to win. I hope it is a competitive game. If both teams play their best Wesleyan wins by 10.

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