It would be easy to say Saturday visits to the Cave Spring gym by the Abingdon Falcons have not been kind.
In early January, Abingdon made to long trek to Southwest Roanoke County, only to get plastered 100-50 in a Saturday matinee.
Saturday night in the Conference 32 title game, the Falcons kept things much closer, but still came away with the same result as Cave Spring raced to the 68-50 win.
“Cave Spring is hard to defend,” Abingdon first-year head coach Johnathan Hubbard noted outside the Falcon locker room. “They’re fast and we were hoping to slow them down a little bit. Our plan was to get back in transition and go with a 2-3 zone defense. We wanted all five guys going to the boards on every shot. I’ve challenged them that every time we’re on defense, it’s not a stop until we get the rebound.”
“It was a physical game and a game of runs,” Hubbard added. “Their runs were bigger than ours. The style of play here is different from our area. The refs let them play more and it’s more physical. You have to learn to take a punch and come back swinging. I’m proud of the effort my guys gave tonight. You’ve got to earn these wins.”
Crashing the boards of the offensive end paid dividends for Abingdon, with a number a second-chance points, but it also opened the floodgates for the explosive fast-break Knight transition game.
“We got some easy layups off misses when they were sending 4 guys to the boards ,” Cave Spring head coach Jacob Gruse said. “In the early part of the game I think we were still wiped out from last night’s rivalry game (a win over Hidden Valley that took the form of stall-ball by the Titans). “
“Still, this is a good win and it gave us back-to-back Conference 32 championships. It was another good test.”
Abingdon jumped out to a 6-2 lead to open the game, but senior Mason Reyer’s 3-pointer moments later put Cave Spring up 7-6, and the Knights would never trail the rest of the contest.
Senior Brody Hicks followed with a trey, Reyer sank a pair of free throws and Hicks took advantage of an outlet breakaway for a slam that paved the way to an 18-11 Cave Spring lead after one quarter.
Reyer opened the second quarter with a strike from behind-the-arc and with junior Jared Steele spearheading a late 7-1 Knight run with a 3-pointer and driving layup, Cave Spring headed to the break up 38-24.
Cave Spring essentially put things away to start the third quarter, using deep treys by Reyer and Hicks to go on a 12-2 surge that increased their lead to 50-26. The Knights led 59-36 after three and coasted the rest of the way.
Reyer and Hicks tied for game-high honors, scoring 21 points apiece for Cave Spring. Senior Zach Shannon added 8 points for the Knights, while Steele netted 7 and junior Baker Haviland 6.
Abingdon was led by Ean Basham’s 13 points, while Derrick Yates added 10 for the Falcons.
With the win, Cave Spring will host Rustburg Tuesday night in a Group 3A West regional quarterfinal.
Bill Turner
