In the first half, it was the 3-point shooting guards. In the second half it was the power forwards inside. But in the last seconds? Carl Trice on a penetration move. The Blue Devils guard improvised a bit on his team’s last offensive play — it was designed for him to kick the ball out after he got inside. The only problem? He was allowed to go right to the basket, forcing him to make a decision.
“It was supposed to be that I come off a screen and pass it to an open teammate,” Trice said. “But I saw that opening gap and attacked and my coach believes in me so I believed I could do it.”
It turned out to be the game winning shot for Fork Union in a game that looked to be well wrapped up with 90 seconds to go, but St. Christopher’s refused to go quietly into the night which forced Trice to come up with the big play. The Blue Devils led by 10 late, but when Alexander Petrie converted an and-1 with less than 30 seconds to play, somebody had to step up late. Trice came through and after that, Petrie’s last second shot just missed at the sound of the buzzer. And so just like that, the Blue Devils held off the top-ranked Prep League squad and the fourth-ranked team in VISAA Division 1, for an 80-78 victory.
“We held on for dear life,” said FUMA coach James Pelham. “To be up 10 points late, I’ll take that any day of the week, but we still have to learn from this. But I was proud we persevered from this.”
The story outside of Trice and Petrie’s late heroics was Fork Union’s split half effort between its outside shooting in the first half, its frontcourt play in the second, and the uncanny individual effort that St. Christopher’s point-forward Nic Sherod put together. The University of Richmond-bound Saint led all scorers and rebounders with his 42 points (fueled by four trey’s and a 12-for-14 night at the charity striple) and 11 rebounds, and played all 32 minutes. To combat that, Fork Union had four players finish in double figures.
It was a close contest throughout with Fork Union taking a 17-16 lead in the first quarter before taking a 6-point lead into the break thanks to it’s 3-point shooting with Adisa Gittens-Smith, Detwon Shelton and others connecting from beyond the arc. The philosophy changed in the second half though as Josh Nevers and Oshari Baldwin pacing the way offensively with their work in the paint.
“In the first half we were 1-for-6 and then ended up 6-for-12 from the 3-point line, so it ended up working out for us there,” Pelham said. “In the second half we came out and attacked the basket, our guards penetrated and hit the big guys for layups so it was great to see those guys get going. It just happened that way tonight and I’m proud of both big guys. We needed every single rebound and bucket we got from them.”
In the third St. Chris was able to trim the lead to just two points with Sherod and Petrie leading the way while Nevers and Baldwin helped the Blue Devils maintain the edge. That set up a crazy fourth.
“It was a case of too little too late,” said St. Christopher’s coach Hamill Jones. “We did not play the defense we expected to play and you have to give credit to FUMA, they played a great game. It was a combination of that and them playing so well offensively.”
The Saints (18-3, 6-1) took a 55-54 lead early in the fourth, their first since the first quarter but behind the play in the paint and free throw shooting, FUMA went back up 65-59 with four minute to go. The Blue Devils led 75-65 inside of two minutes to go after Gittens-Smith converted a pair of foul shots. But with the Saints forcing a pair of turnovers and some defensive stops, things changed quickly. Ned Tazewell’s and-1 make it it 76-75.
“It was crazy because we got too comfortable — I think we started celebrating too early and let them back into it,” Trice said.
Two free throws from Stanley White put FUMA up 78-7 but Petrie’s and-1 knotted things back up at 78-78 before Trice came up with his game saving basket.
“We’re confident now that we can beat any team in the Prep League,” Trice said. “We’ve been feeling that way but now we have the confidence. We just have to box out and attack the basket. We do that and something good comes out of it.”
On the night, Gittens-Smith led FUMA with 15 points. Baldwin had a career best 14 points. White finished with 11 points. Shelton, who battled significant foul trouble in the second half and saw his minutes trimmed, finished with 10 points. Both Nevers and Trice had nine points. Nevers and Shelton both had five rebounds and two blocks. Trice added six assists.
“This was huge to beat a team like St. Chris, we needed this,” Pelham said. “We’ve been playing well but still have struggled. A win like this helps a lot. It shows our guys we can play with anybody. Hopefully we’ll continue to ride this wave.”
Fork Union (4-8, 2-4) travels to Fuqua today at 6:30 p.m.
