Basketball Briefs

Marshall Boys

The Marshall Boys continued to struggle, extending their losing streak to three in a row with consecutive losses in crucial games against division opponents Fairfax High School and W.T. Woodson. The losses drop the Statesmen from second to fifth place in the Liberty District. Friday’s game saw a concerted effort from Marshall with 7 players scoring, led by Jordan Culbreath and Daniel Dixon both scoring 9 points. They gained additional help on the boards from Patrick Dixon who pulled down 8 rebounds to go with his 5 points.

But their team couldn’t overcome clutch plays down the stretch from reserves Nate Brooks and Brandon Lewis, as well as a strong shooting performance by Patrick Yoo (12 points, 50% FT.)

Tuesday night, the Statesmen ran into a brick wall against division leader W.T. Woodson, who held Marshall below 40 points for the second time, the only team that has held the Statesmen below 40 points this season. Scoring was led by Junior Daniel Dixon who scored 8 points and added three assists. But Marshall couldn’t overcome the powerful Woodson who won the rebounding game 24-15 and racked up 10 steals.

Marshall’s 3 game losing streak drops their record to 11-10 overall, and 7-6 in the Liberty District, putting them in sole possession of fifth place.

Marshall Girls

No one saw it coming, not even W.T. Woodson’s own players. Coming into Tuesday night’s contest, no one would have even imagined that a game between the two top teams in the Liberty District would result in a 39-point blowout. But a barrage of nine three-pointers in the first half quickly turned what should have been a titanic clash into a lopsided contest in a matter of 16 minutes, as Woodson downed Marshall 73-34, handing the Lady Statesmen their first district loss of the season.

With their 11-game winning streak snapped, Marshall fell back into a tie with Woodson for first place in the Liberty District. Should both teams win their season finales on Friday, the teams would share the regular season title and the top seed in the district tournament would be decided by a coin flip.

The Lady Statesmen travel to Langley this Friday at 7:45 p.m. Their record currently stands at 17-4 and 12-1 in the Liberty District.

Falls Church Boys

After dropping two losses to Mt. Vernon and J.E.B. Stuart, the Jags picked themselves up and split the week, losing to division rival Washington and Lee but then pulling out a nail biter against West Potomac High School. The Jags failed to get out to a quick start and trailed throughout the game, facing intense pressure from W&L, which held Falls Church to only 9 points in the fourth quarter.

Meanwhile the Jags faced a long range barrage from Generals’ shooting specialist Josh McDaniel who buried 7 3-pointers for 21 points. For a while it looked like the Jaguars would face a similar fate against the West Potomac Wolverines, trailing by 12 points at half-time. But behind an offensive showing by Junior guard Chris Jerro (17 points, 3 assists) and a defensive effort by Kevin Nesmith (7 rebounds, 5 blocked shots) the Jaguars were able to end their three game losing streak, winning by three, 58-55.

The split week brings the Falls Church overall record to 7-13, though the conference loss to Washington and Lee drops their division record to 4-7, placing them sixth in National Division, a half game behind J.E.B. Stuart.

J.E.B. Stuart Boys

After a strong week where the Raiders racked up victories against conference rivals Falls Church and Yorktown, Stuart’s boys faced tough games against Mount Vernon and Annandale High Schools. With a division record of 4-5 the Raiders needed a win to stay ahead of Mount Vernon in the National Conference. But Mount Vernon came out fast scoring 26 points in the first quarter and the Raiders were never able to recover despite outscoring the Majors in the second and fourth quarters.

In the end, the game came down to Stuart’s inability to stop Majors’ Junior E.J. Dawson who dropped 21 points on the Raiders and grabbed 9 rebounds, with 5 steals. The final score was 72-53 Mount Vernon. Playing against Annandale, the Raiders again failed to slow down the game, allowing their opponents to score over 60 for the second straight game, losing 63-43. The two losses drop the Raiders to 6-13 and 4-6 in division play. Their conference record places them fifth, just behind Mount Vernon.

McLean Boys

The Highlanders continued to struggle this past week, losing twice to arch-rival Langley and conference opponent South Lakes, bringing their current losing streak to 8 games. McLean went into the game against Langley hoping to cut into the small lead that Langley held over them in division play. And for most of the game it seemed they would do just that.

From the start, things looked good for the Highlanders, up by 4, 12-8 when the horn sounded for the first quarter, and leading 26-18 when the players headed to the locker room for half-time.

But the Saxons came out strong in the second half, holding even with McLean in the third quarter, before storming back in the fourth to win by 1, 47-46 after David Thompson hit 2 free throws with 1.2 seconds left in the game. Brendan McCook carried the highlanders for most of the game scoring 19 points, 8 for 12 from the field. Freshman Tarek Ammoury, who has been brilliant at times this year, also did well, contributing on both sides of the ball (10points, 3 assists, 5 rebounds.) But with less than 2 seconds left to go in the game with Langley down one, Thompson went to the line, draining both his free throws to complete the comeback.

After the crushing defeat against Langley, the Highlanders had a hard time getting into the swing of things against South Lakes High School on Tuesday night, as they allowed the Seahawks to jump out to a 17-8 lead in the first quarter. The Highlanders came back with 18 points in the second quarter, but could only cut the deficit to 12 by half-time. After the break they were able to stay with the Hawks until the fourth quarter, when South Lakes picked up their scoring, winning by 17, 65-48. Once again Tarek Ammoury had a strong performance (10 points, 4-10 shooting) and Senior sibling Basem added 14 points, 6 rebounds and 5 assists. But it wasn’t enough as the Highlanders fell to 1-12 in conference play and 2-18 overall.

Mike Hume may be emailed at mhume@fcnp.com