BURLINGTON–There’s no place like home for the holidays.
Unfortunately, it’s a place that Orange basketball won’t be seeing for awhile.
On December 23, the Panthers played the Ivanhoe Knights out of Australia at Northeast Guilford High School. It started a string of ten consecutive games away from Panther Gymnasium.
In the midst of the coldest winter in several years, there’s also the problem of illness and fatigue.
Sure enough, the Orang men’s basketball team was sick and tired as they entered Burlington last Friday night. Coach Derryl Britt didn’t make the trip because he was under the weather. Assistant coach Lemont Jones, who lives six minutes away from Williams High in Graham, learned at about 1 o’clock on Friday afternoon that he would serve as acting head coach.
While Orange’s shooting was as cold as the winter early, the Panthers overcame foul trouble to post its fifth straight win over Williams 66-60. Junior point guard Kai Wade led the Panthers with 20 points as Orange improved to 10-4 overall, its best start ever in Britt’s seven-year tenure.
Orange didn’t trail after the midway point of the first quarter, but never built a lead larger than eight points until the final minute of regulation.
Jaeden Smith paces Williams (5-6, 0-1 in the Central Conference) with 21 points.
With Orange leading 29-24 at halftime, Panther senior Michael Clark opened the second half with a stickback bucket to give the Panthers its largest lead of the game. Whenever Orange pushed its lead out to seven points, the Bulldogs found a way to draw closer. Williams’ Cavion Stokes drained his only field goal of the game beyond the arc narrowed the Panthers’ lead to 38-34. Orange senior Freddy Sneed, who finished with 14 points, scored on an acrobatic lay-in. Just moments after checking into the game for the first time, the Bulldogs’ Kyrian Fuller scored off a lay-in while getting fouled by Jalen Crayton. Fuller’s free throw reduced Orange’s lead to 38-37 with two minutes remaining in the third quarter.
Orange junior Ethan Ellis came up with back-to-back 3-pointers from the same spot in the left corner to extend the Panther advantage to 44-37.
Elliot, who scored eleven of his 15 points in the second half, started the fourth quarter with a dribble drive lay-in to cut the Panther lead to 44-42. Orange center Hector Garrido got two offensive rebounds on a possession that wound up with Xandrell Pennix scoring his first three-pointer of the game. After Elliot scored on another lay-in, Pennix immediately drained another shot from downtown. Wade knocked down seven free throws in the final minute to keep the Bulldogs at bay.
Smith scored 15 of his 21 points in the first half.
Women’s Basketball: Orange 58, Water Williams 41: On the night she claimed her 20th career double-double, Orange senior Evelyn George may have come the closest anyone has in women’s basketball history to a triple-double.
George finished with 18 points, ten rebounds and seven assists as Orange rolled past Williams in Burlington to win its first Central Conference game. Senior center Marshea Byrd added eleven points and four rebounds as the Lady Panthers won in Burlington for the first time since December 6, 2018.
Despite finishing seventh in the Southeast Alamance Holiday Hoops Invitational, the Lady Panthers made its presence felt. They extended Southeast Alamance to double overtime on December 27 before falling 74-72. Orange senior Shannon Murphy scored a career-high 18 points against the Stallions. Maura McMurtry added 21 points to lead Orange against the Stallions,
After losing to Green Hope in the consolation round, Orange easily put away Northeast Guilford 60-28 in the seventh place game. George finished with 15 points and 12 rebounds. Byrd came away with five points and ten rebounds. McMurtry finished with 14 points off 4-of-9 shooting from 3-point range.
With the win over Williams, Orange is now 6-6 overall.