WC, VHS

Published 12:00 am Thursday, December 27, 2001

drop tourney openers

[12/26/01] JACKSON Christmas is over for another year, but Warren Central kept on giving against West Lauderdale in the first round of the Jackson Public Schools Tournament Wednesday.

WC (12-8) shot 49 percent from the floor and outrebounded West Lauderdale 34-20, but committed 31 turnovers and faltered down the stretch in a 76-61 loss.

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“We just weren’t ready to play and they were,” WC coach Preston Wilson said. “We didn’t do a good job of handling the basketball, and they took control of the game.”

Calvin Moore led West Lauderdale (13-3) with 27 points and seven rebounds, while Boo Ramsey added 26, Karlos Lewis had 13 points and seven assists and Andre Adams had 10 points.

Carlton Bradford scored 17 points on 7-for-9 shooting and Sherman Logan had 22 points and 10 rebounds for WC, which will face Jefferson County today at 4 at Wingfield.

“You want to win, and it’s tough to lose the first game,” Wilson said. “It makes it tough to get up and play the next one.”

Against West Lauderdale, the Vikings fell behind early and had to play catch-up the rest of the way. The Knights used a 7-0 run midway through the first quarter to open a 19-12 lead and never trailed again.

Still, WC was never behind by more than 10 points until late in the game. The Vikings answered every spurt by the Knights with one of their own to keep the deficit around five points for most of the game.

Turnovers ended almost every WC run, however, and allowed West Lauderdale to push the lead back to a comfortable margin each time.

“We turned it over, and once we got behind they were so much quicker and more athletic,” Wilson said.

West Lauderdale scored the final three points of the third quarter to take a 54-46 lead, and finally put the Vikings away with a 12-4 surge midway through the fourth quarter. Led by Moore and Ramsey, who scored 25 of West Lauderdale’s 40 points in the second half, the Knights opened a 69-55 lead with 3:05 to play and never let the Vikings get any closer.

“They just got hot, that’s all. We should’ve stepped up and got hot, too,” Logan said.

West Lauderdale was 8-for-11 from the field in the fourth quarter and forced seven WC turnovers while evening up the rebounding battle, 6-6.

“We limited their shots in the second half to one,” West Lauderdale coach Duran Clark said.