Clear Lake Falconhoops

Clear Lake 58 - Clear Creek 48
On Friday night in the new Krueger Field House on the campus of Clear Lake High School, the Falcons defeated the Clear Creek Wildcats by a score of 58-48. With a single game remaining in the regular season and the 24-5A district championship still on the line for the Falcons, the Lake – Creek rivalry was for more than bragging rights for both teams. With four teams advancing to the playoffs in 5A this year for the first time ever, it was a must win for the Creek hopefuls as well.

Both Pearland and Lake have secured positions in the playoffs. A Lake win over Alvin on February 14, (Valentine's Day for those fellas who tend to forget), will tie Pearland and Clear Lake with 11-1 records and the district championship will be shared. A coin toss will decide which team is seeded as the district winner in the bi-district round of the playoffs.

Third and fourth place were still up for grabs with Clear Brook, Clear Creek, and Galveston Ball vying for the two remaining spots. Brook’s 13 point win over Creek Tuesday night and Lake’s win over Creek tonight put Brook in the number 3 spot. This means Creek must win over Brazoswood and rely on Brook to defeat Galveston Ball next week to secure a playoff berth. Considering Brook beat Ball by only 2 points at home, a victory over Clear Lake would have made life much simpler for the Wildcats so they were highly motivated.

Although Clear Lake had defeated Clear Creek by a 21 point margin in Creek’s gym in the first round of play, the spirited Wildcats were a much improved team and it was not as easy a victory for Lake as many might have expected. The Falcons established an early lead and never trailed in the contest but it was too close to relax throughout the first three quarters and the early part of the fourth period. With over a minute gone in the second half, Kendrell Thompson started the half with a three pointer to give Lake their biggest lead in the game up to that point, 30-19. Thompson had a game high 14 points ( 9 of which came in the fourth quarter). The third quarter closed with only a five point margin, 38-33, with Creek still very much in it.

Throughout the first half and through much of the third quarter, Clear Creek’s defense set the tempo of the game while Lake enjoyed a slight lead. A Creek bucket at the beginning of the final quarter narrowed the game to three points, 38-35. Then Lake went to work on the Wildcats. Consistently solid defense and nine unanswered points by Lake widened the gap to 12 points, 46-35. It was not the 22 point blowout that Lake had inflicted on the Wildcats in the fourth quarter of the last game in Creek's gym but it did get the job done.The Falcons were in control from this point but the pesky Wildcats hung in there. The 10 point margin of victory for the Falcons is not indicative of the wide difference in talent between the two squads (especially off the bench) and some of the Creek crowd might have considered it a moral victory.

There were numerous instances of unselfish play from most of the Falcons and at times watching Lake’s offense is like watching a well oiled machine execute with precision and predictability. The variety of different successfully executed plays is more numerous than most Lake teams in the past which speaks highly of the versatility of the Falcon players (and of the coaching). Lake’s defense, especially early in the second half, was impressive at times but still too inconsistent. Weakness in the defense by one player often causes the team’s defense to break down despite standout performances from as many as three or four of the players on the court.

Please Note: Photos for this game and of the Seniors Night recognition of their parents can be found at http://picasaweb.google.com/falconhoops. after 5 p.m. on February 10. It will be helpful if you read the GENERAL INFO writeup on using the new ALBUMS on the new site. Note there are two albums for each game, one for dial up users and one for broadband users (much larger file sizes) who wish to make prints of the photos. In addition two photographers have contributed photos of the Creek game. These photos are in separate albums. Neither of these men have sons on the Varsity team this year. We are deeply indebted to them both for their efforts. After you view their work on the Creek game and some others, you may wish to buy them a steak dinner!


Individual Scoring: Kendrell Thompson 14, Fulton Brisco 10, Jimmy Witten 10,
Armie Lewis 9 (6 steals), RJ Turner 7, Cody Kinsey 3, Christian Enriquez 2, Anthony Bilcic 2, Andrew Gorie 1,

FALCON STATS	FG made	FG attempts	%
2's	17	33	51.5%
3's	4	16	25.0%
free throws	12	17	70.6%

SCORE BY QUARTER	1	2	3	4
Clear Lake	14	27	38	58
Clear Creek	7	19	33	48

LINESCORE	1	2	3	4	Final
Clear Lake	14	13	11	20	58
Clear Creek	7	12	14	15	48

REBOUNDS	LAKE	CREEK
Offensive	8	12
Defensive	10	13