RENO — Carson High’s recipe for success Friday night against Wooster was simple.
Put together some solid scoring runs, pound the ball inside and play good defense.
The first-place Carson Senators did all three thing en route to an easy 67-31 win over the Colts at Craig Congdon Gymnasium in a Sierra League boys basketball game.
Carson improved to 8-0 in conference play, and now must prepare for its biggest week of the conference season — contests against defending regional champ Galena (Tuesday at home) and a Friday road game at Bishop Manogue.
The Senators played the game without starting guard Asa Carter, who was away on a college football recruiting visit at Northern State University in Aberdeen, S.D.
“Next week is big,” admitted CHS coach Carlos Mendeguia. “Galena is the defending regional champion, and we had a couple of great (double-overtime) games against Manogue.
“We’re giving the kids the day off today, and we’ll be coming back Monday morning ready to get to work.”
Galena knocked off Carson twice at home last season, including a decisive win in the regional final, denying the Senators a chance to go to Las Vegas for the state tournament.
“It is a big week,” said junior forward Tez Allen, who scored 16 points and helped hold Myster Smith to just one bucket. “We have to have three good practices next week, listen to what our coaches are telling us, and then go out and execute. We have to get revenge (for last year).”
Mendeguia said he’s seen Galena a couple of times in person (at the Rail City Classic), but hasn’t watched hardly any film on Manogue.
Carson left no doubt of the outcome in this one, scoring the game’s first eight points and racing to a 17-5 lead after one quarter and a 35-14 bulge after 16 minutes. Carson had surges of 8-0, 7-0 and 7-0 in the opening half.
Wooster was a dismal 27 percent from the floor in the opening half and turned the ball over 11 times. Smith was a dismal 1-for-9 in the first half, mostly against Allen.
The Colts needed Smith to pick up the slack for leading scorer Isaac Zinnerman, who was out with an injuy. Smith never got started.
“We thought Tez’s length might bother him a bit,” Mendeguia said. “That was our game plan to put Tez on him whether Zinnerman had been there or not.”
“I play club ball with him, so I know what he likes to do,” Allen said. “Once he gave up the ball (on a pass), I tried to make it tough for him to get it back.”
Allen and Jayden DeJoseph made their presence felt at the offensive end of the floor. DeJoseph had 13 of his 17 in the first half and Allen had 10 of his 16.
“We knew we could take advantage of them on the inside,” Mendeguia said. “Both Tez and Jayden were able to get good position down in the blocks. We did a good job of pushing th ball downcourt.”
The Senators kept their foot on the throttle in the second half, biuilding their lead to 45-18 with 3:05 left in the third quarter thanks to a 10-4 run on two baskets by Allen and one each by Jared Rooker, DeJoseph and Jace Keema.
The lead grew to 34, 59-25, on the strength of a 9-0 run to start the final period. Keema had two more baskets and Ian Schulz contributed a three-point play. The reserves played the final five minutes, putting together a game-ending 8-2 run.
“Ian gave us some good minutes,” Mendeguia said. “We were down a guy (Carter), so guys needed to step up. I thought Kyle Krebs and Cody Azevedo helped balance us out at guard.
“We had a total team effort today. Guys came in and contributed.”
Krebs drained a 3-pointer to open the game while Azevedo contributed all five of his points in the first half. Schulz contributed four points.