Southern Ohio Sports Authority is presented by OhioHealth.
WHEELERSBURG — For 48 consecutive minutes, Wheelersburg took the “best shot for Wheelersburg” on Friday night.
It’s something that Alex Prater and his coaching staff have preached all year long and, in the Pirates’ biggest game so far this season, they took that sermon and ran with it.
CREDIT: Derrick Webb/SOSA
Behind a blistering 49 percent shooting percentage, Wheelersburg (6-1) handed visiting Portsmouth its first loss of the season by a 68-51 final — a game the Pirates never trailed in.
“Portsmouth, being a storied program like they are, we have a lot of respect for them and it’s always a marquee matchup for us. It’s a rivalry game and we don’t shy away from that,” Prater said. “I’m just really proud of our kids for staying composed and maintaining our energy. They’d make a run and we’d make runs back at them. We haven’t been great with leads this year. But we were able to put our foot down in the third quarter and separate.”
Devon Lattimore and Braylon Rucker were the catalysts behind that movement. The dynamic scoring duo combined for 45 points on the night and each and every time the Trojans (6-1) seemed to be making a run, one of the two had an answer on the other end.
But beside Lattimore and Rucker was Landon McGraw, who, quite simply, out-hustled every other player on the floor all night long.
McGraw tallied nine points, a game-high 14 rebounds and two assists in his team’s biggest win to date.
“Landon is one of the guys that’s consistently in the gym,” Prater said. “He works extremely hard and he’s constantly in the weight room. He’s conditioned himself to be able to play in that type of energy and manner. That’s credit to him. He’s improved a lot over the past year. He does a lot of little things well for us, he can guard, he can rebound and he can score, too.”
Tale of the tape
From the jump, Wheelersburg held the lead. That started with two free throws from Xander Mowery at the 4:58 mark in the first quarter. Portsmouth’s DeAndre Berry then answered with the first of his many buckets before McGraw sank back-to-back shots to extend the Pirates’ lead to 8-4 with 2:41 to play.
After a bucket from Portsmouth’s Donnovan Breech, Lattimore went to work and provided an answer with a score through contact, making it an 11-6 lead with 1:59 left.
Lattimore would repeat that process with 1:04 remaining, tallying a second old-fashioned three-point play and pacing the Pirates to a 17-10 lead heading into the second.
“We haven’t played too tough of a schedule yet,” Lattimore said in the postgame. “So we knew we were going to have to come out and play as hard as we could in this one. [Portsmouth] was undefeated but we knew it was our time to come shut that down.”
Berry and Breech did all they could to catapult the Trojans back into the ballgame, cutting the deficit to under 10 points on multiple occasions. But Lattimore wouldn’t be denied, scoring 11 of the Pirates’ 21 points in the quarter, giving them a 38-27 advantage at the break.
PHOTOS: Images from Wheelersburg’s win over Portsmouth
“We want to be great on the defensive end, we want to be careful with the basketball and we want to take the right shot for Wheelersburg,” Prater said. “That’s what we say all the time. We forced a couple of shots in the first half, but we addressed that at halftime and came out in the second half and played under control.”
After Berry and Breech brought Portsmouth to within seven at 41-34, Rucker dialed long distance twice to extend the lead back into double digits at 47-34. Lattimore then nailed a pair of freebies for a 49-34 count with 3:35 remaining.
Portsmouth still wouldn’t go away. Breech hit a pair of 3’s before a bucket from Berry ended the frame with Wheelersburg’s lead standing at 53-45. The Trojans, however, ran out of gas early in the fourth.
Lattimore and Rucker tallied back-to-back scores, pushing the edge to 58-45, before McGraw provided the dagger — a 3 that made it 63-47 with 2:58 to go. That was more than enough cushion for the Pirates to pick up their sixth victory.
Stat book
Lattimore led the Pirates in scoring with 25 points while Rucker added 20 points and hit four triples. McGraw followed with a near double-double while Hunter Bivens also chipped in with four points and five rebounds.
All in all, Wheelersburg etched eight names into the scoring column.
“We talk to our guys a lot about the system that we’re running and we want all of our guys to eat,” Prater said. “Our goal is to always put five guys in double figures. We didn’t quite get there tonight, but we love the fact that our guys are competing and sharing the basketball well.”
Portsmouth was led by Berry, who finished with 23 points, eight boards and two helpers. Breech added 16 points of his own, Lamarcus Parker had five points, and Noah Livingston helped the cause with three points and a team-high 10 rebounds.
What’s on tap
While Portsmouth attempts to bounce back into the win column on Friday, hosting Chesapeake in Ohio Valley Conference play, the Pirates return to the hardwood on Tuesday with a trip to Jackson.
After a 2-4 start, the Ironmen — fresh off a win over Gallia Academy — have won five straight.
“It’s going to be a challenge for us,” Prater said. “We’ve got a lot of respect for coach [Max] Morrow at Jackson and he’s a guy that runs his program the right way. They’re very defense-oriented and they’ll make it tough on us.”
BOX SCORE
Portsmouth: 10-17-18-6 — 51
Wheelersburg: 17-21-15-15 — 68
Portsmouth: 20-66 FG, 5-9 FT, 6-22 3pt., 31 rebounds (Livingston 10), 10 turnovers, 10 assists (Lewis 4). Scoring: Berry 23, Breech 16, Parker 5, Lewis 4, Livingston 3.
Wheelersburg: 25-51 FG, 13-21 FT, 5-18 3pt., 34 rebounds (McGraw 14), 13 turnovers, 7 assists (Bivens 3). Scoring: Lattimore 25, Rucker 20, McGraw 9, Bivens 4, Evans 3, Adkins 3, Mowery 2, Swords 2.
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