On a night where the Plymouth Big Red honored past and present military members with special digital camouflage jerseys, they decided to honor those American heroes by defending their home court. By playing lights out defense.
PLYMOUTH — On a night where the Plymouth Big Red honored past and present military members with special digital camouflage jerseys, they decided to honor those American heroes by defending their home court.
By playing lights out defense. During a 53-48 Firelands Conference win over the South Central Trojans on Saturday night that kept the Big Red atop the league standings, the Big Red put their best defensive effort forward when their offense struggled to buy a bucket, especially in the second half.
“We were playing terribly on both sides of the ball in the first half and we were still up one,” Plymouth sophomore Izaya Reynolds said. “We knew we had to pick it up on both ends of the floor with the understanding that if we do make a mistake on offense, we can get back and play great defense. Once we turned our defense into offense, we felt we were in a good spot.”
Owning a 31-30 lead at the half, Plymouth came out of the halftime locker room and went ice cold on offense losing the lead and seeing the Trojans jump out to a 36-32 advantage, the Big Red’s largest deficit of the second half. It wasn’t until the 2:25 mark of the third quarter that Plymouth made a field goal when senior Jarrett Burrer knocked down a 3-pointer to make it a one-point game. The shot sparked a 9-0 run highlighted by six straight points by Reynolds, who led the Big Red with 16 points.
During the offensive freeze, Plymouth played stellar defense allowing just six points in the third quarter.
“We stepped up our physicality,” Reynolds said. “We got out of our groove to start the second half, so we really had to play tough defense until Jarrett (Burrer) hit that big 3 and then everyone got back in it. We tell ourselves that we cannot lose unless we let ourselves lose. We have a choice to win or lose and we chose to win.”
In the fourth, the Big Red and Trojans traded blows, but Plymouth never lost the lead.
“I was so happy with our resiliency,” Plymouth coach Tim Brafford said. “The kids fought clear to the very end even though there were times when they could have given up. We weren’t hitting anything and that is a credit to South Central playing great defense with a lot of physicality. We had trouble with that, but we adjusted at halftime and fixed a lot of little things that helped us pull off the win.”
Burrer paced Reynolds’s 16 with 11 points of his own while Lex Grose added seven, Sean Winfield had six, Jackson Bays scored five, Keegan Beverly and Mason Stine chipped in with three apiece and Cainan Kilgore rounded out the scoring with two.
Plymouth was 15-for-33 from the free-throw line with Reynolds going 7-for-8 on his own. Despite shooting 45% and seeing several lead changes, the Big Red (9-2, 7-0 FC) never wavered.
“I feel like we can always come back,” Brafford said. “I am getting tired of having to, but we have done that all year. We were down to Monroeville and Crestview and clawed back because they fought to the end. We just have great kids like that.”
Plymouth now owns a two-game lead in the Firelands Conference standings after St. Paul knocked off Monroeville on Saturday night. Brafford knows this is no time to get comfortable and it is on his players to create more space. Plymouth hosts Wynford on Jan. 20 before traveling to Mapleton on Jan. 23 for their next FC matchup.
“When we came in at halftime, I told the guys that I just went in and looked at my desk and there wasn’t a Firelands Conference trophy in there,” Brafford said. “No one is just going to give it to us. If they aren’t going to go out and fight to the end, they aren’t going to get it. Every single team is going to give us their best shot and it would make their season to knock us off. We have to respond to their effort and I think we did that tonight.”
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This article originally appeared on Mansfield News Journal: Plymouth Big Red beat South Central Trojans in Firelands Conference boys basketball
Category: General Sports
