Stories

Closing the door: Albemarle boys pull away from Western in the fourth

Photo by Tom Pajewski

Last season, Western Albemarle threw an array of post players at Austin Katstra and was able to wear Albemarle’s big man down.

 

This year? No such luck.

 

“Coach (Greg Maynard) was really preaching before the game ‘don’t do anything outside your comfort zone, usually you’re banging around in there just let the game come to you’,” Katstra said. “That really helped me in my mind (to know) that some physicality is good but don’t wear myself down.”

 

Katstra scored 10 of his 20 points in the fourth quarter as the Patriots pulled away for a 58-51 victory over the Warriors, a huge win in Albemarle’s first big test of the season. Katstra and fellow senior Jake Hahn played essentially the entire game for Albemarle and didn’t seem to lose a single step to fatigue down the stretch.

 

“They really can go the whole game, they want to go the whole game,” said Albemarle coach Greg Maynard. “I try to give them a minute break here or there but that’s their mentality, they want to play as long as they can.”

 

That worked out just fine for Albemarle, who was tied at 41-41 going into the fourth. That’s when the Patriots started to push the ball inside to Katstra, who took control with an array of tough shots. He’d opened the game with two-straight 3-pointers, so it was about as complete of a performance as the senior pulled down 12 boards. Hahn notched 11 points and pulled down seven rebounds.

 

Western Albemarle, meanwhile, struggled in the fourth, unable to match the Patriots intensity in that final frame.

 

“I thought the team that was the toughest won the game, I thought they were tougher than us down the stretch,” said Western coach Darren Maynard. “We were pretty tough for three quarters but we couldn’t sustain it and they did.”

 

The Warriors’ Ryan Ingram led the offense with 12 points and three rebounds. Teo Rampini had seven points and 10 rebounds. Austin Cress had seven boards.

 

“Ryan Ingram has been a great player for four years and I keep waiting for him to graduate but the bad thing about that is when he graduates I’m going to lose Jake and Austin,” Greg Maynard said. “So he can stay as long as he wants I guess.”

 

It helped that Albemarle countered at the guard spot a little better than they have in the past against Ingram, with Cartier Key doing a lot of the little things at the point while J’Quan Anderson scored 15 points and picked up a number of loose balls on hustle plays that helped give the Patriots an edge.

 

“(Anderson has) been huge, he’s improved so much, he’s a great driver, he can finish through the whole defensive team if he needed to and his shot’s improving,” Katstra said. “I’m really excited.”

 

Down the stretch, Western Albemarle couldn’t get anything to fall from outside either, which was completely out of character for a squad that has started the season shooting well from beyond the arc.

 

“We shot very poorly and that’s a part of it — it probably simplifies things too much,” Darren Maynard said. “We gave them several easy baskets just with a lack of effort and once we got down five or seven we just couldn’t make anything to catch up.”

 

The Patriots will travel to take on Fluvanna County Tuesday at 6 p.m. while Western will travel to take on Orange County Tuesday night.

Comments

comments