PM Boys Snare Comeback Win, 68-61
It may not have been the greatest comeback in Parry McCluer High School basketball history, but it sure was a big one.
Trailing by 10 points with under three minutes to play in the third quarter, the PM boys rallied past James River to post a 68-61 victory in their home opener on Tuesday of last week in Buena Vista.
“I loved how we dug in,” said PM head coach Tyler Kerr. “To dig in when we needed to, get stops defensively, and get rebounds when we needed to felt really good. I’m really proud of our team; they showed some mental toughness and some grit out there tonight.”
The Blues, who improved to 3-2 overall heading into the brief holiday break and handed the Knights (4-1) their first loss of the season, trailed most of the night and were behind 47-37 when JR’s Riley Carlisle drove the baseline for a chip shot inside with 2:47 remaining in the third period. Then PM started to rally.
Langston Cook, PM’s leading scorer, reeled off five unanswered points, and with 43 seconds left in the quarter, Nathan Glass turned a JR turnover into a runner down the lane, cutting the lead to 47-44 heading into the final stanza.
PM forced turnovers on the visitors’ first two possessions of the fourth quarter, with Jamier Jordan feeding Glass for a slam dunk after the first and Glass scoring inside after the second. That second bucket put PM in front, 48-47, for the first time since they scored the first two baskets of the game.
“I felt a real shift of momentum right at half court [at the beginning of the fourth quarter],” noted Kerr. “Nathan got his hand on the ball; Jamier got the steal, threw it up to Nathan for the dunk. That really got the gym involved, and the kids really started to bear down. I thought that was a turning point.”
At the same time, the Blues suddenly got hot. Shooting just 5-of-17 (29.4 percent) from three-point range in the game and a dismal 1-of-12 from long distance through the first three quarters, PM got four straight treys in the fourth to create some separation. Jordan hit the first with 6:29 to play, and then Quentin Rosser canned two straight, the last coming at the 5:17 mark to cap a 13-2 PM run to open the fourth quarter. Jordan hit another 3-pointer with 4:30 left to give the Blues their largest lead, 60-52.
“Early, with that first game at home, we were a little amped up, and the shots were going long,” Kerr explained. “At halftime, we told them to settle in because we’ve got some guys who can really shoot the basketball. We reminded them to go out and make some plays, and they did. The outside shooting got much better in the second half.”
The Knights were not finished, however, and cut the PM lead to 64-61 when Ryder Ward hit one of two free throws with 1:42 to play. But the Blues got another dunk from Glass with 38 seconds left, and Cook sealed the win with a pair of free throws with just 9.7 seconds on the clock.
Cook, who stands just 11 points shy of 1,000 for his career, paced the Blues with 24 points, while Glass poured in 19 for the PM cause. Rosser added eight points, and Brody Coleman chipped in six.
Carlisle led JR with 19 points, and Maddox Pichay tallied 12. The Blues jumped out to an early 4-0 lead in the contest, but the Knights connected on exactly half of their shots (13-of-26) in the first half, including four 3-pointers to take control.
Ward’s long jumper at the first-period buzzer gave JR a 17-12 advantage, and that is where the lead stayed until Mark Voight canned a trey and Carlisle hit his shot on the baseline to give the Knights the 10-point cushion late in the third quarter.
That’s when the Blues dug in defensively. PM forced 19 JR turnovers in the game, including the two big ones to start the final period to put the Blues ahead to stay.
“They were really shooting the ball well,” Kerr said. “But we took some pride in getting some stops. We had to find a way to not get down. It seemed like we were just trading baskets, and when you’re down five and six points, you just can’t trade baskets with people.”
The Blues were scheduled to face local rival Rockbridge County on Monday night in Lexington. Results of that game can be found online at thenews-gazette.com, and a full story and photos will appear in next week’s paper. The two schools will face off again this Saturday, with a tripleheader in Buena Vista, featuring the junior varsity boys beginning at 2:30 p.m. The varsity girls’ contest will follow at 4 p.m., and the varsity boys are scheduled to round out the action at 5:30 p.m.
PM will play at Auburn on Monday, starting with junior varsity action at 6 p.m., before returning to Pioneer District action on Tuesday at Highland County, with the varsity game only at 7 p.m., following the 5:30 p.m. girls’ varsity game.
ABOVE, JR’s Jeremiah Mays holds onto the ball while PM sophomore guard Quentin Rosser guards him. Rosser scored eight points. AT RIGHT, Fighting Blue senior forward Nathan Glass goes up for one of his two slam dunks in the fourth quarter. Glass scored 19 points. (Ronnie Coffey photos)
