Pressure 'D' ignites Cougars' offense

By News-Argus Staff
Published in Sports on January 24, 2014 1:48 PM

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Facing yet another tall team, Goldsboro resorted to its full-court press to speed up the tempo Thursday evening.

Boy, did it ever.

The Cougars scored 38 points during an 111/2-minute stretch between the second and third quarters, and dismantled Ayden-Grifton, 82-48, in an Eastern Carolina 2-A Conference game contested before a sparse turnout at Norvell T. Lee Gymnasium.

Rasheen Artis tossed in a game-high 23 points for Goldsboro, which beat the Chargers for the fourth time in their last five meetings. Backcourt mate Myron Carmon added 18 points, while Eric Bufkin provided 13.

Goldsboro (11-4 overall, 2-1 ECC) opted to negate Ayden-Grifton's height by employing a 2-2-1 full-court press. The Chargers succumbed to numerous turnovers, which allowed the Cougars to seize a 20-10 lead barely six minutes into the opening quarter.

"We got them in a running game and had two big guys down there (in the paint)," second-year GHS head coach Russell Stephens said. "I knew they had some good size, but I didn't realize they were that long. We figured if we could get them in a running game, that was to our advantage with Artis and Myron pushing the ball ... looking for shots in transition."

Trailing by 10 with 5 minutes left before halftime, Ayden-Grifton decided to use a full-court press of its own. The Chargers coaxed the Cougars into three consecutive turnovers, which trimmed a 27-17 deficit to 27-23 within 79 seconds.

Stephens called timeout to settle down his team.

Ayden-Grifton started to miss shots and had to scramble back in transition against Artis and Carmon. Carmon tallied 12 points and Artis converted a pair of traditional three-point plays as Goldsboro's lead swelled to 45-27 at halftime.

"We didn't score any more," AG head coach John Moye said. "The guys we count on to control the ball kept turning the ball over which led to easy baskets for them. I didn't think their press really hurt us that bad.

"It was just turnovers ... turnovers."

Goldsboro led 65-34 after three periods, and both coaches emptied their respective benches during the final eight minutes. Twelve players scratched in the scoring column for the Cougars, who shot 32 of 51 (62.7 percent) from the floor for the game.