BASKETBALL: West Laurens gets one of four in home basketball openers

Though football is still going strong on the Westside, roundball season has also arrived in Dexter, where West Laurens’ hoops teams played their first set of home and region games this past week. 

Both the Raiders’ girls and boys are still finding their footing with some young teams that are each four games into the new campaign. 

The former picked up the first win by either on Thursday night in a 60-21 rout of Westside Augusta, after dropping their first three contests against Vidalia, Screven County and Baldwin in some uphill second halves. 

The West Laurens boys, still shorthanded as they await the return of multiple key players finishing up their duties on the gridiron, fell to Coffee and Bacon County in tournament play late last month before suffering losses in both home openers – Tuesday’s against Baldwin by a lopsided count of 86-28, and Thursday’s a much more competitive final of 67-53. 

Though success and confidence have been slow to develop for each, both groups’ head coaches are optimistic about what’s in store once the season gets going. 

The Lady Raiders’ Tyler Rogers, beginning his fourth year at the helm, is proud of the effort and intensity he’s seen so far. 

“Through the first three games and a scrimmage, we were a pretty scrappy group,” he said of the junior-dominated squad, whose key returners are still technically young players, but each have considerable playing experience. “We’ve been able to play a lot together, we’ve just got to continue to work to get better to find the way just to win games.”

The nucleus, composed of guards Brooklyn Jackson, Maddie Ridgway and Jahalee Snead along with forward Jadah Philyaw, has been through a lot since most broke in as freshmen, and before that playing together in middle school. 

Their strong chemistry has bled over a good bit to teammates around them in the playing rotation, though it’s not always evident during portions of games so far where getting everyone on the same page has occasionally been a challenge. 

“It’s kind of spotty right now,” Rogers said. “There are stretches where we look really good and you can tell we’ve been playing together, then there are times where we look lost… I still think that’s us learning to continue to work to play together still being a relatively young team, even though we had a lot of young girls who did play varsity minutes last year.” 

Thursday’s victory was easily the team’s best performance so far this season, against a Westside team that struggled shaking its defense. 

The Lady Raiders were a bit streaky, as always, on the offensive end. But the Patriots’ scoring lulls were much longer and more frequent. 

The visitors’ biggest ran the course of the second period, as West Laurens doubled its point total after leading 14-6 through a quarter for a commanding halftime lead, and kept its foot on the gas coming back out. 

Tournament losses at Vidalia, 48-21, and against Screven County, 53-34, the weekend before Thanksgiving had the Lady Raiders 0-2 coming into their region opener Tuesday at home, against a rebuilding Baldwin squad that was solid as always, but not nearly as dominant or overwhelming in height, size or speed as it has been recently.

The Bravettes, who may still be a region front-runner despite the loss of forwards Kassidy Neal and Janaye Walker (who were cornerstones of consecutive region championship and state playoff runs), were not able to run away with the game until the second half. 

West Laurens held its own through two quarters, leading 14-12 after one and 22-21 at the break. 

But a rough third quarter offensively, marked by a 16-0 Baldwin run over about six minutes in which every shot seemed to fall on the visiting end with zero luck on the home side, did them in. 

“Some of the things we’ve gotta continue to work on is continuing to score the basketball,” Rogers said. “Our rotations look good at times on defense, but we have a hard time putting the ball in the basket. We’ve just gotta do a lot better job of not turning the basketball over and take care of it.” 

The Raider boys are still waiting on at least a couple members of their football-playing core – seniors Juvon Hill and Shannon Adkins among key players who are still in pads – to join the team. But their roster, even with the two additions, will still be overwhelmingly young this season as they try to replace eight seniors who were each a vital part of a deep lineup that won 11 games last season. 

Upperclass experience, in the current playing rotation, is in fairly short supply, though West Laurens has had some good moments at stretches in its run of games so far. 

“Right now we are extremely young and inexperienced, but that’s not an excuse not to come out every night and play with incredible energy and effort,” said West Laurens boys head coach Izell Stephens. “Once we figure that out I think they will see how good they can be. Overall I was proud of the effort, but we have a lot of things to correct and get better at.” 

The Raiders fell 85-59 and 66-59 in its openers against Coffee and Bacon County the week of Thanksgiving. 

They were taken apart by a strong Baldwin team on Tuesday, but had one of their best performances to date in a Westside game Thursday that was never out of reach. 

West Laurens traded baskets and leads with the Patriots until a 10-0 visiting run before the half led to a deficit of 30-24 at the break. 

Though the Raiders kept it within a possessison or two for stretches of the third and fourth, they ultimately couldn’t overcome the drought as Westside pulled away. 

“I think we played with more effort and intensity last night,” Stephens said. “We made some costly mistakes and unforced turnovers that turned into points for Westside.” 

West Laurens will go on the road for the first time in region 4-AAA action Tuesday as its teams visit Howard. The Raiders return home next Friday to host Aquinas, and then welcome a different set of Fighting Irish from closer by as Dublin comes calling the afternoon of Saturday, Dec. 13.