Knights trounce Tigers on opening night
Robbinsville – Now THAT’s how you make a statement in the Smoky Mountain Conference.
Playing host to the Rosman Tigers in the division opener Tuesday night, all three Black Knights basketball team stepped off on the right foot, as the junior varsity Knights picked up a 63-41 win, the varsity Lady Knights handled the opposition 65-25 and the varsity Black Knights used a second-half surge to triumph, 66-39.
Varsity boys
It took the Robbinsville Black Knights 18 games last season to get their first conference victory. Ironically enough, that win also came against Rosman.
But what a difference a year makes. Robbinsville’s cohesiveness ahead of this campaign was evident in the preseason and on full display in its 2021 debut, as the Knights had raced to a 19-6 advantage by the end of the first quarter.
“We were ready to play, no question,” boasted Knights head coach Jake Beasley. “We came out of the gates blazing. We’ve still got a lot of things to work on, but I agree with what the kids said in the locker room after the game: we’ve got better chemistry now than we’ve had the past two years and it’s only the first game.”
A trio of 3’s and several trips to the foul line helped Rosman close the gap to 31-21 by halftime and the Tigers continued to dig in the third stanza, cutting the deficit to 37-29 at the midpoint.
But a combination of composure and conditioning spiked an 8-1 Black Knights’ run soon thereafter, with Kamdyn Jordan and Brock Adams pairing up to open up Robbinsville’s offense in the paint as the third quarter clock ticked down.
“We have a bunch of scorers on our team and everybody can play multiple positions,” said Adams. “This was definitely a ‘team’ win; once we get everybody going, it’s hard to stop us.”
“I told them at halftime not to worry about what they’re doing; we need to worry about what we can control,” Beasley explained. “I challenged them to come back in the second half and play the way they did in the first quarter.
“We kept our composure when things started going bad and they lost it. No question, we played great ‘team basketball’ in the second half.”
Varsity girls
Defensive pressure kept the Tigers reeling for the majority of Robbinsville’s 40-point win, which marked off one major item on head coach Lucas Ford’s preparatory checklist.
“Over the past couple of years, we’ve focused on offense, but the girls have bought into making defense a priority and tonight, our defense turned into great offense,” Ford noted.
“Rosman has a good basketball team; they’re very well-coached. I told our girls that we needed to forget about tonight – but know how good we can be from this night, because when we go to their place, they’ll be out for blood.”
The Lady Knights led 17-7 at the end of the first quarter, a segment punctuated by Halee Anderson draining her second trey of the opening eight minutes at the buzzer.
“I thought we did really good,” Anderson said. “Everybody did great talking and playing as a team tonightm and that was the difference between us and Rosman.”
Robbinsville led by 16 at halftime and suffocated Rosman in the third, only allowing three Tigers points to drop.
“Starting off with such a good win is going to set us up for a great season,” predicted senior Gabby Hooper. “You can always get better and as the season goes on, we will.”
“Our girls were passing up good shots for great shots. That’s unselfish basketball and that wins,” Ford concluded.
Xander Wachacha had a team-high 28 points – including five 3’s – to lead Robbinsville in the junior varsity victory that began the afternoon.