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Published Tuesday, November 18, 2008 in Sports

East Coweta teams split games with Creekside

By Stuart Crosby

The Times-Herald

SHARPSBURG -- Since assuming the head coaching spot for the East Coweta Indians, Ronnie Vandiver was hopeful of seeing what his club could do against a quality basketball team.

The Indians gave their coach reason to feel optimistic Tuesday night as they defeated the Creekside Seminoles 71-64 in a hard fought Region 4-AAAAA opener at the John Thrower Gymnasium.

After dropping their season opener Saturday to McIntosh 58-54, the Indians opened with an aggressive style that forced mistakes by the Seminoles which led to several baskets in the first period.

"This is the way I envisioned our team would play when I took the job," he commented. "I hope we have some more in us and try to get better."

After Creekside scored the game's first points on a three-point basket, the Indians went on a 9-0 run to until the Seminoles converted a pair of baskets to cut the EC lead to 9-7.

However, the Indians answered with a three-pointer by Justin Taylor and a two-pointer by Khambrel Hugley-Brown that started a 10-2 run and the faithful had reason to cheer after the Indians took a 19-9 lead with 2:28 remaining in the period.

The Seminoles rallied at that point with a 15-4 run that cut the margin to 21-16 at the end of the period and a 24-23 lead in the first minutes of the second period.

A basket by Brandon Farmer allowed the Indians to reclaim a 25-24 lead with five minutes remaining in the half, but an 8-4 run by the Seminoles gave them a 32-29 lead at intermission.

In the opening moments of the third period, the Indians displayed the style that allowed them to dominate most of the first period as a 12-5 run gave them a 41-37 lead with 3:57 remaining.

The Indians kept the pressure on the Seminoles over the remainder of the period and led 54-45 going into the final eight minutes of regulation.

An Indian victory was not a sure thing in the beginning of the fourth period as the Seminoles tried to rally, but an exchange of baskets by the two clubs as well as solid defense down the stretch kept the margin from getting any lower than six.

Farmer led the way for the Indians with 24 points, Hugley-Brown had 22 while Taylor finished with 11 points to go along with several key rebounds in the game.

"We battled all night to get the win," Vandiver said about the game. "Creekside has a good team and they showed that tonight but we had good games by a lot of people to get the win."

The win gave EC a split in the varsity portion of the evening as the Lady Indians were unable to overcome a sluggish second period in a 55-42 loss to the Lady Seminoles.

After defeating McIntosh 39-37 in their opener on Saturday, the Lady Indians evened their overall record to 1-1.

The first period was close as Creekside had a 9-6 lead, but the opening minutes of the second saw them go on an 11-6 surge to take a 20-12 lead with three minutes remaining in the half.

The Lady Seminoles eventually took a 28-14 lead to the locker room but the Lady Indians remained competitive in the third period despite trailing 40-28 going into the final period.

In a losing cause, the Lady Indians were led in scoring by Tyresha McKenzie and Yasshyrah Mulkey who posted 13 points each while Angelica Zackery finished with eight.

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