01-03-14
BY JACK BULLOCK
CARTERVILLE – The Nashville Hornets picked up a key road victory in the SIRR Mississippi Division on Friday night at Carterville by capitalizing on their strengths while exploiting the Lions’ weakness.

The very large front line of Coach Brad Weathers’ club got inside and outside scoring from Daniel Thorson and Clint Johannes and took advantage of Carterville’s second half foul problems in a 51-38 win.

Johannes, a 6-foot-7 senior forward, scored 15-points. He turned out to be “Mr. Outside” on this night as he hit a trio of 3-pointers for his evening.

Thorson, a 6-foot-1 junior guard, did most of his damage driving to the basket as he also finished with 15 on the night.

Not letting the quicker Carterville club use its athleticism was also a key as the Hornets improved to 9-5 overall and 3-0 in the Mississippi.

Nashville connected on 21-of-32 free throws on the night, including 16-of-24 in the fourth quarter.

The Lions saw their record fall to 7-4 on the season, 1-2 in the Mississippi Division with Matt and Will Galik scoring 13 and 12-points respectively in defeat.

“That was a hard-fought win against a good ballclub. We’re very fortunate to get out of here with a win,” said Coach Weathers. “We have some kids inside that have physical strength and I thought late in the game we made good passes. We had eight turnovers in the first half and gave up eight offensive rebounds. That was one of our focal points at halftime. We got off to a strong start and the beginning of the third quarter to get us a lead.”

With both teams playing zone, it was the Hornets who showed the best patience for most of the night and attacked when needed.

After surviving a first quarter where they had six turnovers, Nashville took care of the ball much better in the final 24-minutes to post the victory.

Coach Weathers’ club jumped out to a 10-6 lead at the first quarter horn, forcing Carterville into a 2-of-10 first period showing from the field.

Johannes canned two of his trey’s in the period, and his shot that banked in from the top of the arc gave the Hornets a four-point advantage.

“The shots weren’t going in for us tonight and when that happens you have to do other things well to win. We wanted to turn up the tempo a little bit and create some more turnovers,” said Carterville head coach Scott Burzynski. “I thought we did a good job of turning them over in the first quarter but we just didn’t take advantage.”

Though Nashville’s other big man in the paint, 6-foot-7 sophomore Royce Newman was held in check for most of the night (seven points) Nashville showed that they have other weapons.

With Johannes and Thorson both scoring key points in the second quarter, Nashville broke the game’s final tie late in the quarter to go into intermission up 19-16.

Carterville’s Matt Galik nailed a 3-pointer from the right wing to tie the game at 16.

However a conventional three-point play by Thorson on a drive to the basket while being fouled by sophomore Austin Swalls gave Nashville its three-point halftime edge.

This bucket helped trigger the game changing run in the second half by the visitors.

The same trio that had been scoring for Nashville in the first half opened the third quarter with a 9-0 run that forced a Carterville timeout.

Newman scored on a nice spin move in the lane to open the half.

Then Thorson got to the basket on a pair of drives, which was followed by another long range shot by Johannes.

Before Carterville knew what hit them, the Lions needed a break at 28-16.

In that stretch, the Lions had seven possessions that turned into four missed shots and three turnovers.

Coach Burzynski’s squad didn’t quit and made a brief run to close the third quarter and begin the fourth.

The Lions got a pair of baskets by the Galik’s, on a drive in the lane (Will) and a baseline jumper (Matt) to close the third.

A 3-pointer by Matt Galik cut the lead to just 33-28 to open the final frame.

But the foul problems that the Lions had to deal with on this night became a parade to the free throw line for the Hornets.

Nashville took control of the game and gradually pulled away from the line. Spreading the floor and working the offense, the Hornets got to the foul line and converted enough to pull away.

Carterville failed to close the gap as they hit just 3-of-11 shots from the field and committed five more turnovers, to give them 16 for the game.

“When you play Nashville and you get down 10 points, it is like being down 20. It seemed like we were fighting uphill after that initial run they went on after halftime,” said Coach Burzynski. “Give them a lot of credit. They played offensively the way that they wanted to play. They anticipated that we wanted to take Newman away and I think we did a good job the majority of the night. But they made some 3’s and won the game.”

Nashville shot the ball well enough from the floor to post the road triumph, hitting 13-of-29 overall (44.8 percent) while hitting 4-of-10 from the distance.

They survived 14-turnovers while being dead even on rebounding with the hosts as each team had 26-boards.

The Lions weren’t so good shooting the ball, hitting just 12-of-44 overall (27.2 percent).

Carterville’s next action will be next Friday when the host Sparta in a conference game while the Hornets will host Pinckneyville on the same night in a battle of unbeaten conference rivals. The Panthers are also 3-0 in the league after beating Anna-Jonesboro at home on Friday night.

“It was a contrast of two teams. Carterville has four really good perimeter players with good quickness and then you have us with good size but not nearly as fleet of foot,” said Coach Weathers. “So we felt like we had to zone and match up to bother their shooters. Likewise they (Carterville) were going to have to deal with our size.”