Jazmen Moore slips past a gauntlet of King George opponents. (Photo by Loren Kuske)
By Daniel Sherrier
Editor
King George didn’t make it easy, but the Lady Cavaliers bested the visiting Foxes in basketball action Friday night with a final score of 51-42.
Coming off a 10-day break due to inclement weather postponing last Tuesday’s game against Spotsylvania, the Cavs got off to a lukewarm start in the low-scoring first quarter.
King George got on the board first within the initial 30 seconds of the game, thanks to a basket by the Foxes’ Elissa Davis, and they maintained a slim lead as the clock ran out on the first quarter. The Cavs had difficulty sinking most of their early shots, but the defense kept the score down to 6-5.
The Cavs came alive in the second quarter, snatched the lead, and refused to let it go for long—but not immediately. A two-pointer and a foul shot expanded the Foxes’ lead to 9-5, but the Cavs’ Hope Toliver went to work closing that gap. After teammate Rejon Hawkins sank a free throw but missed the second, Toliver caught the rebound, took the shot, and claimed the lead for the Cavs at 10-9.
That lead slipped away briefly, but the Cavs’ Jazmen Moore was having none of that, nailing a three-pointer that was soon followed up by another Toliver basket. And Moore wasn’t the Cavs’ only three-point shooter that quarter—Mykaila Smith sank a pair of treys in quick succession.
The half ended 21-15. The lead was Caroline’s; now they just needed to hang onto it.
King George initiated scoring in the third quarter, but that gain was soon cancelled out by another shot from Toliver. Moore contributed another three-pointer to the cause. With help from Jayla McNeill and Markashia Washington, the Cavs gained 16 points, and the Foxes saw the game slip further away, the gap widening to 37-29 in favor of Caroline.
The Foxes put forth a valiant effort in the final quarter, stealing away the ball and bringing the score as close as 48-42 after the Cavs had enjoyed a comfier 44-30 lead a few minutes in. Alexis Brown made the Cavs’ final two-pointer of the night, with Moore adding one more free-throw basket for good luck to yield the final 51-42 score.
Toliver was the Cavs’ top scorer Friday night, adding 20 points to the board, followed by Moore and her 14 points, which included a trio of three-pointers.
“Our girls just came out tonight a little flat,” the Lady Cavs’ head coach, Tim Marshall, commented after the game. He attributed that to the 10-day break since the previous match, when the girls defeated Colonial Beach 52-49 in an away game Jan. 20. “It was that long week off. But we managed. They fought, but we managed to pull it off.”
“King George has a really good team,” Marshall said. “In a couple years, looking at that JV team, they’re going to be hard to beat.”
The Lady Cavs’ junior varsity team lost to King George 38-20 before the varsity teams took the court.
The game against Spotsylvania was rescheduled to this Monday, Feb. 2, and the Lady Cavs next take on James Monroe on their opponents’ turf Feb. 6, followed by a game at Courtland Feb. 9.