By Staff
Jeff Byrd
Special to the Enquirer
In a game marked by offensive lulls on both sides, an important Area 15-5A win went to the home standing Cullman Bearcats Tuesday night.
Bearcat junior guard James Nyquist was the only player on either side who could score consistently throughout the game. Because of that, Cullman wraps up the No. 2 seed in Area 15-5A after beating arch rival Hartselle 45-35.
Hartselle won the girl's contest 60-49 for its sixth straight win.
Cullman boys 45, Hartselle 35
Nyquist led all scorers with 20 points. He scored in every period but no
shot was bigger than his three-pointer with 3:43 left in the game.
The shot ended a Cullman spell where it had seen a once 18-point lead
whittled down to six at 34-28. The Bearcats were held scoreless for the final 4:15 of the third quarter and that allowed Hartselle to trim the big deficit to single digits at 31-23.
When Nyquist drained his trey, it put the Bearcats back up nine at 37-28.
Hartselle was unable to come any closer the rest of the way.
With the win, Cullman locks up the No. 2 seed for next month's area
Tournament at Athens. The Bearcats improve to 12-7 overall and 3-2 in area play. Head Coach Mike Dean was elated with the win and credited the big shot by Nyquist.
"That was a huge shot for us," Dean said. "I called time out just to thank
James for hitting that shot. It really stopped the bleeding for us."
"When I caught the ball, I saw where I was all alone," Nyquist said. "I just had some good rhythm tonight."
Hartselle, which falls to 8-12 on the year, had little consistency on
offense. They did not score a single point in the second quarter and then went nearly four minutes in the third quarter before putting together a 10-0 spurt to close the quarter.
"We pretty much stayed with our 3-2 zone the whole time," Nyquist said. "We just matched up better after he (Sam Massey) opened the game by hitting those shots from the corner."
Massey hit two three-pointers to open the game for Hartselle. He added a third trey to earn nine for the quarter. But he was held scoreless for the remainder of the game.
Cullman got a basket in the lane from Zayne Smith to go up 12-11 after the first quarter. The Bearcats then got two free throws from Nyquist to go with a driving basket by Tyler Powell to make it 16-11.
Powell later drained a three-pointer for a 19-11 lead. Hartselle could not buy a basket and the Bearcats continued to pull away. The quarter ended with Cullman up 24-11.
Nyquist scored five points early in the third quarter to boost the Bearcat lead to 31-13. Hartselle made its run behind baskets from Eric Norwood and Keith Rodgers.
Two free throws by Adam Pryor made it a 33-27 game with 4:44 to play.
Following his trey, Nyquist converted both ends of a one-and-one to boost the lead to 11 at 39-28 with 3:07 left.
Cullman would make 4-of-6 free throws over the next two minutes to build the lead to 12 at 44-32 with 50 seconds left.
Joseph McPhillips had seven for the Bearcats. Justin Britt and Powell each had five.
Massey led Hartselle with nine, while Rodgers had seven.
Hartselle girls 60, Cullman 49
Cullman waited a quarter too long to get started. The Lady Bearcats, now 5-7 and winless in area play at 0-5, scored just three points in the opening quarter.
Hartselle, winners of sixth straight, jumped out to an 18-3 lead.
Then Cullman got going with 24 points in the second quarter. Jessi Allred notched 11 of her 13 points in the period while Maria Richard had two layups off steals.
It was Allred's three-point play that made it 32-27 at halftime.
Hartselle, now 13-7, got six points each from Lauren Drake and Shan Jones to build the lead back to 47-33. It was 48-37 after the end of three quarters.
Down 12, Cullman made one last push late in the game. Sarah Barnes dropped in a three-pointer to make it 55-46 with 1:30 left. She added a second trey to make it a 6-point game at 55-49 with 57.2 seconds remaining.
Hartselle came back with free throws from Jones to lock up the game.
"We got it back to six after Sarah hit those shots but Hartselle just did a good job down the stretch," said Cullman girls coach Lee Dunn.
Drake finished with 22 points to lead Hartselle. Jones chipped in 13 and
Mary Reeves had 11.
Colleen McDaniel had nine and Barnes ended with seven for Cullman.