Wise 58, Gwynn Park 46

In the anticipated nightcap between two county public school teams with aspirations of winning their respective state titles in March, the host Wise boys' team overcame a slow start to edge away from Gwynn Park, 58-46.

Wise (6-1) started slowly, spotting Gwynn Park 6-0 and 10-3 leads before the Pumas closed out the first quarter on an 8-0 run and eventually held the Yellow Jackets scoreless for nearly six minutes before Brandon Ford (16 points) hit a three-point field goal two minutes into the second period to end the drought. Ford was the only member of the Yellow Jackets to reach double-digits on Wednesday.

"I think it might have been nerves, jitters," said Wise coach and athletic director O.J. Johnson. "We just had to collect ourselves early. We had seen them several times during the summer and realized they didn't have our size inside, so we just played a zone and made them shoot and boxed out inside. They have a good team, but tonight they struggled a little bit from the outside."

Wise owned a modest 23-21 lead at the break and the teams were tied on four different occasions midway through the third quarter until the Pumas used a 10-0 run to claim a 43-31 lead and eventually took a 44-35 lead into the fourth quarter. Jonathan Allen (10 points), John Savoy (15 points) and Anfernee Robinson (13 points) each contributed during the run that gave the Pumas a little breathing room heading into the final eight minutes.

"The bottom line was, we just didn't score," said Gwynn Park (4-3) coach Mike Glick. "You can't beat too many teams in the county when you only score 46 points. We just did not shoot the ball well tonight. They played a zone and stayed in it and we didn't shoot well." 

After Robinson opened the fourth quarter with a bucket for Wise, Gwynn Park countered with a 7-0 run to get within 46-42 with 4:30 remaining on a three-pointer from Kevin Miles. But the Pumas would limit the Yellow Jackets to only one more field goal during the contest and the hosts widened their advantage by hitting 8 of 13 free throws over the last three minutes.

tblack@gazette.net