Early Troy Threes Sink Zumwalt South

The Troy Buchannan Trojans boys basketball team wasted little time in establishing control of last night’s non-conference game against the Bulldogs at Zumwalt South. 

The Trojans held a 16-9 advantage at the end of the first quarter. Troy’s outside game made the difference in the first quarter, with Ben Chaney’s 3-pointer at the 5:45 mark giving Tory a 5-2 lead. Chaney nailed another three at the 1:30 mark to give the Trojans a 16-7 lead. Derek Deters also had a trey in the first quarter. The Trojan’s rebounding helped create quality shooting opportunities from the beginning. 

“We talked out it all week, we need to guard better so we can get defensive rebounds and run off of our defensive rebounds,” said Troy coach Ryan Meyers after the 64-47 win. “We didn’t want to come down and go against their set defense. We knew they were going to play that matchup zone and it’s something we didn’t want to go possession by possession against. We talking about guarding and rebounding and we did that. We limited their second chances and we got them to miss and we were able to run off of those misses.”   

Troy continued to control the lead throughout the second quarter and led 29-19 at halftime. While the Trojans capitalized from a strong outside game in the first quarter, Tory scored more and more baskets in transition throughout the contest. 

“We got a lot of easy buckets in transition tonight and I thought that was the key to stretching our lead,” Meyers said. “It also helped that we hit threes early. We shot the ball early. We got some good looks. It set the momentum for the game.”  

Tory outscored Zumwalt South 15-9 in the third quarter and 20-19 in the fourth quarter. The Trojans also capitalized from the free throw line, going 14-for-17 from the charity stripe. 

The Trojans had four players in double figures: William Johnson (23), Chaney (15), Deters (12), and Kyle Westerman (10). George Cater led South’s offense with nine points.

“Coach gave a great speech before the game and we were all fired up,” Chaney said. “He talked about how we went to state last year and finished second. We might not realize it but every team we play is going to come out with a lot of intensity. It fired all of us up.” 

South coach Bill Friedel his team was “outplayed in every quarter.”  

“We have to work on every aspect of our game to compete with the top tier teams right now,” he said. “We’re not doing that.”  

The Trojans improve to 10-5 with the win. South drops to 4-8.