Second-quarter surge carries Knoch boys past Valley
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Tuesday, December 18, 2018 | 11:15 PM
After opening the season with five road games, Knoch was eager for the comforts of home Tuesday night.
Following a slow start, the Knights caught fire and rolled to a 69-47 victory over longtime rival Valley in a nonsection encounter.
Scott Fraser scored 23 points and helped spur a 16-0 surge to start the second quarter.
“We were down seven points and we just haven’t been shooting the ball well lately,” Knights coach Ron McNabb said. “But there was no quit in our guys tonight. We had a great second quarter, made our shots, and I thought our guys did a good job handling their pressure.”
A putback by Addison Jackson ended the lengthy dry spell for Valley.
Knoch evened its record at 3-3, while Valley fell to 1-4.
Fraser scored twice off steals as Knoch got four 3-point field goals as the Knights outscored the Vikings, 25-6, over the quarter.
“Naturally, I’m disappointed,” Valley coach Mark Faulx said. “I thought Knoch played really well. I thought the night looked like how they wanted to play and less how we wanted to play. They got great shots, and we did not get great shots.”
Senior guard Nyjewel Carter poured in 28 points for the Vikings, including eight 3-pointers.
Usually, a coach wouldn’t be happy with the person assigned to guard that type of scorer, but McNabb was happy with the effort by Jared Schrecengost.
“I know Nyjewel had 28, but I thought ‘Schrec’ made him work very hard for all those points,” McNabb said. “He didn’t get many easy looks. I was really proud of us at both ends of the floor tonight.”
The Vikings were called for 13 fouls in the first half. But Faulx didn’t feel their rotation was hampered.
“We had talked about pressuring and containing and not fouling,” Faulx said. “We have a tendency to reach in and hand check a little bit. This reinforces that message that early foul trouble is about our discipline. I don’t know that it necessarily affected our substitution rotation, but it definitely affected our temperament.”
Despite Knoch often limiting Valley to one shot, the Vikings got their share of rebounds with Elijah Murray collecting 10 and Deontae Ross nine.
Knoch’s biggest lead came on a 3-pointer by Brady McKee to take a 51-22 advantage. The Vikings then reeled off 13 straight points, but it was too late to significantly cut into the lead.
Julian Sanks scored nine points for Knoch on a trio of 3-pointers, and Adam Bajuzik came off the bench to nail a pair of 3-point shots in the pivotal second quarter.
Valley resumes section play Friday at Shady Side Academy, and Knoch travels to Mt. Pleasant for its section opener.
George Guido is a freelance writer.
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