Dragons Drag Raiders

The Pickens County Dragons met the Southeast Whitfield Raiders in the first round of the Region 7AAA basketball tournament Tuesday evening. The Dragons lambasted the Raiders 75-42.The Dragons simply had too much size for the vertically challenged Raiders. Pickens was able to commandeer twice as many rebounds as the Raiders (36-18). The Raiders couldn’t buy boards with a gift card to Lowes. Pickens also had seven block shots to the Raiders zero. Sam Crawford had his own personal block party with the hat trick of three.

The Dragons used their size advantage to keep the Raiders from plundering the paint all night. Pickens used a zone defense which forced the Raiders to settle for outside shots which weren’t falling. The Dragons began the game with a 9-4 run which turned into a 23-8 lead at the end of the first quarter.

The Raiders were never in the game as the Dragons kept attacking the back door of the Raiders defense throughout the night. The Dragons repeatedly scored off alley-oop lay-ups via back door cuts. Crawford was the recipient of many of these passes. He finished with the game high in points and rebounds, 16 and nine, respectively. Jordan Shaw, who finished with 14 points and eight assists, assisted on most of the back door cuts.

The highlight of the game came when Shaw channeled his inner “Skip to My Lou” with a playground style behind the back lay up that brought ‘oohs and aahs’ from many onlookers. That made the score 37-10 with 1:51 left in the half. The Raiders were able to pull off a 7-2 run to finish the first half down 39-17.

Pickens began the second half in man to man defense but still managed to limit the Raiders to outside shots. The Dragons continue to scorch the Raiders with numerous back door cuts. The Raiders were never able to get anything going and eventually both teams cleared the benches letting the younger inexperienced players get in the game.