With a heavy dose of Ryan Ingram in the first half and a hard-nosed defensive effort throughout, Western Albemarle dispatched Monticello 69-50 Friday night.
A week after guiding the Warriors to a huge win over Albemarle with a solid performance, Ingram simply caught fire against the Mustangs in the first half, pouring in 26 points before the break including a quartet of 3-pointers.“It was a special night,” Ingram said. “I felt like everything I was putting up was going in.”
He wasn’t wrong. Ingram finished with 32 points on the night, hitting from all over the court. Ingram flashed at least one step-back mid-range jumper, a couple of strong drives to the basket among other big-time shots.
Monticello scrapped and clawed back into the game in the second half, but couldn’t seem to get over the hump and knot things up as Western allowed few second chances on the boards. Michael Vale led the Warriors with eight rebounds while Jared Carter notched seven boards.
“They work really hard, they’re some of the best offensive and defensive rebounding people, they do a really good job,” Ingram said.
With Ingram posting 32 points along with three assists, the Warriors didn’t need a lot more offense, but Nick Yankey, Vale and Chris McGahren each chipped in eight points. All eight of Yankey’s points came at the free throw line. Western went 31 of 44 at the free throw line as a team. The Warriors were also able to weather some foul trouble for a number of their post players and still play strong defense down the stretch.
“I thought our defense was really good the whole second half after the first two or three minutes,” said Western coach Darren Maynard. “We have some depth in the post so when we do get hit with foul trouble it’s not the catastrophe it is for some people some times.”
Rashad Brooks led the Mustangs with 14 points while Savion Thomas had 11 and Anthony Lee checked in with 10. Monticello went 23 of 36 from the charity stripe.
Western will jump right back on the court Saturday against Turner Ashby while the Mustangs try and bounce back Tuesday against Orange.
