By Jay Jenkins / Scrimmageplaycva.com contributor
Mitch Minor and his players agreed that the wait was exhausting.
The Charlottesville coach and all associated with the Black Knights’ program counted the hours before basketball normalcy returned following the sudden ending attached to the regular season finale with Monticello. On Feb. 8, the contest with Charlottesville and Monticello was halted in the midst of the third quarter after a brief scuffle on the court ultimately involved fans in attendance.
Three Charlottesville starters – Ethan Best, Dashaun Blakey and Daquan Jones – were benched temporarily to start and the team looked anxious out of the gate, but the Black Knights kicked things in high gear to keep their season alive with a smooth 88-48 victory over Louisa in the quarterfinal round of the Jefferson District Tournament.
“With the things that have been happening this past week, we really just took a motto in practice of: Be positive and do our best,” Charlottesville junior guard Darius Watson said. “We came in here and we were positive and it turned out to be a good game.”
Minor did not want to elaborate on what went into the decision to keep Best, Blakey and Jones out of the starting lineup, but sent a strong message to his players.
“It is something that I wanted to do,” Minor said. “I felt like even though our guys were perfectly fine (by VHSL regulations) and they could have started, it is part of being disciplined. They know that and they understood that, and they came in and did a good job.”
With the juggled lineup back to what was expected initially, Charlottesville (12-7) was dominant over the final 10 minutes of the first half after Louisa guard Kaleb Corle drilled a 3-pointer from the corner with 2:31 left in the first quarter to trim the Charlottesville lead to 14-11.
Louisa, highlighted by an 11-point effort from senior Keon Winkey, could not get closer the remainder of the game.
In fact, Charlottesville closed out the first quarter on a 7-0 run and pushed the advantage to 49-26 at halftime as it used post players as passing options back to the perimeter to close out the half. Watson nailed three long-range jumpers in the period.
“I was in a comfort zone,” he said.
Minor was able to empty his deep bench by the end of the second quarter, but the starting unit returned in the second half and made the final result an afterthought as Louisa was held to eight points in the third quarter.
“I think the difference in the game tonight was that we shared the basketball and we got the ball to our shooters and they knocked down 3-pointers,” Minor said. “I think our strength is on the inside, but we do have a couple of really good shooters. If we can get that going and make the easy shots I think we can do pretty well.
“We were focused tonight and we knew we had to come together as a group and have a positive attitude on the court and that is what we needed. We wanted to do that from the beginning to the end.”
With the result appearing obvious for Charlottesville, there was a comical moment early in the third quarter as Dashaun Blakey stole an errant pass and attempted a dunk that missed the desired target and switched possession.
After retreating to play defense, Blakey stole another pass in almost the exact same spot on the court just eight seconds later and had a chance for redemption but he missed another dunk.
Blakey, who scored 12 points, was shocked at what transpired, but Minor called a timeout to address the situation.
“I got kind of irritated on the second one,” Minor said with a smile. “There is no question that he can dunk the heck out of the ball, but you missed one and then after the second one I had to call a timeout and say, ‘Hey, use the glass.’
“I know we were up by 27 points … but get the points still.”
Every player scored for Charlottesville, which nailed nine 3-pointers, and the entire team rewarded the fans that remained once the contest concluded by rushing the bleachers.
“That was pretty special,” Minor said.
