Cartersville steamrolls BC Howren, 142-108
June 6, 2009 - World Basketball Association (WBA)
Cartersville Warriors News Release
The Cartersville Warriors stepped out of World Basketball Association play Saturday night and used an 82-point outburst in the second half to blow out Southeast Exposure Basketball League member BC Howren, 142-108, in a non-conference game at J.H. Morgan Gymnasium.
"We played well in spurts tonight," said Cartersville head coach Cory Baldwin, whose team is 4-0 overall and 3-0 in the WBA this season. "We didn't come out ready to play and when we got a 10-point lead, we subbed and our bench guys laid an egg. But we still were able to take a lead into halftime and we got things going in the third quarter. The good part about the third quarter was that a lot of the guys who sparked that run were the same ones who didn't play well in the first half."
Cartersville raced out to an 18-5 lead in the first four minutes of the game, but BC Howren strung together a 7-2 run in the middle part of the frame to stay within 30-23 after the opening 10-minute period. A pair of free throws by BC Howren's Ronnie Donaldson tied the game at 33 with 7:20 to go in the first half, but the Warriors took off on a 27-6 run to open up a 60-39 lead with 1:15 remaining before halftime.
BC Howren didn't go quietly, though, scoring the final five points of the quarter to go into the locker room down, 60-44. Darnell Cox led Cartersville with 16 points and six rebounds, Chucky Frierson had 14, four rebounds and three assists and Kenny Saunders added 10 with three rebounds and three assists. Donaldson paced BC Howren with 13 points and four rebounds.
BC Howren went on an 8-0 run to start the third quarter to make it 60-52 with 9:01 left in the period, but Cartersville outscored BC Howren 42-19 the rest of the frame to take a 102-71 lead into the final 10 minutes. The Warriors cruised in the fourth quarter, scoring 40 more points to build some momentum going into Sunday's 4 p.m. home game against the defending WBA champion Decatur Court Kings.
"Decatur is the defending champs and they have the crown until somebody else takes it," said Baldwin. "This is game we circled on the schedule and hopefully we can build on what we did in the third quarter tonight."
Frierson was the top scorer for Cartersville with 29 points, seven rebounds, four assists and two steals. Six other Warriors reached double figures, with Chris Morgan (19 points, six assists on 5-of-10 3-point shooting), Cox (16 points, nine rebounds), David Graham (15 points, seven rebounds, four assists), Nathan Charles (14 points, eight rebounds), Jeremy Law (11 points, five assists) and Saunders (10 points) all pitching in on the offensive end.
Mike Howren scored a game-high 34 for BC Howren, sinking eight of his 16 3-point shots and 13 of his 26 shots from the field overall. Donaldson finished with 23 points, six rebounds and two assists, Dexter Shaw had 17, Darrell Wilkins finished with 14 points, six assists, five rebounds and two steals and Chris Jones threw in 13 points and six rebounds in the loss.
Following Sunday's showdown with the Decatur Court Kings at the J.H. Morgan Gymnasium, Cartersville is back in action June 12 at Decatur before hosting the Tupelo Rock-N-Rollers June 13 and the Atlanta Speedboys June 14 in another non-conference game.
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World Basketball Association Stories from June 6, 2009
- Cartersville steamrolls BC Howren, 142-108 - Cartersville Warriors
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