By Gary Corsair
Sports Writer
The Yellow Jackets didn’t bottom out in a 51-39 loss to visiting Swain County on Friday.
Hayesville, 3-1 SMC, 5-2 overall, never led, suffered through an 11-minute scoreless drought and trailed by 21, but refused to fold against a Swain, 3-0 SMC, 6-2 overall, team that was taller, more experienced and extremely good at applying full-court pressure.
“We played well at times on Friday,” Hayesville Coach Mike Cottrell stated. “The effort was there.”
The Yellow Jackets trailed 44-25 when Cottrell sent Slade Crouch back into the fray during a timeout with 5:30 remaining to play.
Crouch promptly stole the ball and fed a teammate, who missed. Following a Swain bucket, Crouch stole the ball again, this time taking the rock all the way for a slick, over-the-shoulder lay-up. He drew a foul in the process and iced the free throw.
That superb hustle hoop-and-harm seemed to ignite a passion for full-court pressure and chest-to-chest trapping within the Yellow Jackets.
Back-to-back three-pointers by Luke Lee and Isaac Chandler cut the lead to 44-34, but the spirited comeback was hampered by three turnovers between 2:51 to 2:11 prior to Crouch making his third steal of the quarter and scoring on a lay-up.
Swain preserved the win with clock-eating ball control and by making 3-of-4 free throws in the final 2:21.
Brown’s trey with :17 remaining concluded Hayesville’s scoring and gave him 5 points in the final quarter, same as Crouch.
Three-pointers by Lee and Chandler enabled the Yellow Jackets to outscore the Maroon Devils, 16-12, during the final act.
The previous three quarters didn’t go as well.
Hayesville missed all four three-point tries in the first period, committed six turnovers and went the last 3:49 without a score in the second and was limited to four shots, and didn’t make one until 7:24 had passed, when Swain played cat-and-mouse stall ball in the third.
Swain led 18-9 at the first break, 33-20 at the intermission and 39-23 after three.
“We still have things to improve on to compete with the top teams in this league,” Cottrell said. “The kids are trying hard.”
Crouch led Hayesville with 7 points, 3-of-3 two-point shooting, five steals and five rebounds.
Lee knocked down 5-of-12 shots and tallied 12 points.
Chandler scored 8 and cleared five rebounds. Brown tallied 6 points, hit 3-of-4 free throws, and dished four assists. Landon Hughes scored 6 and grabbed three rebounds.
Hayesville hosted Cherokee, 0-1 SMC, 2-2 overall, in SMC play Tuesday, travel to Highlands on Thursday and play in the holiday tournament at Towns County next week.
Cottrell and his staff are working hard to help the inexperienced Jackets improve before they face five SMC opponents in January.
“I expect us to be at the bottom of the conference right now. Rightly so. We don’t have as many kids coming back and we lost some good players,” Cottrell said in a preseason interview. “This league, top to bottom, is probably going to be as good as we’ve seen in 20 years. This league is so good around the basket. Everybody we play. Murphy has two kids that are over 6’ 6.” Swain’s got some really tall kids. Andrews may be the biggest team. Cherokee is tall. Robbinsville, which won the league last year, has everybody back,” Cottrell said matter-of-factly, without a trace of ‘poor me.’
Hayesville 61, Highlands 42
Ten Yellow Jackets landed in the scoring column when Hayesville busted Highlands, 61-42, last Tuesday.
“Good win on Tuesday,” Cottrell said after the Jackets made just six turnovers as they topped the Highlanders, 2-8.
Chandler, who was under the weather the first two weeks of the season, had a breakout game, drilling four 3-pointers to score a team-high 18 points.
Cottrell wasn’t surprised Chandler lit up the scoreboard.
“This summer, Isaac was our best player,” Cottrell said in a preseason interview. “He had a great summer. I think you’re going to see some real good basketball from him pretty soon,” Cottrell said.
Brown had 11 points and 3-of-3 freebies.
Hughes added 9, Jacob McClure 6, Brown 5, Lee 5, Cooper Matheson 3, Peyton Mcgaha 2 and Jackson Sellers 2.
The outcome was never really in doubt. Hayesville led at each quarter break: 18-8, 33-11 and 46-33.
Hayesville fans hope for a repeat in the rematch Thursday as the Yellow Jackets strive for improvement in a season Cottrell views as a three-phase quest for success.
“We’ve broken this team down into phases,” Cottrell revealed just prior to the season. “Phase one started last year in a coaches meeting in trying to make this team competitive. It took this summer to do that. Phase two was, ‘Can we get them in a place where they are competitive and have a chance to win?’ We’re kind of at that point right now. So Phase three is the last third of the season. Can we be a team that can compete with the top two or three teams in our league and win? That’s the hardest step, to get them to believe that they can compete with the best teams in our league and actually beat them down the stretch. The first two thirds of the season will be learning from experience. The last third of the season we should see that experience pay off.”