Carson High boys basketball
Carson High's Brandon Graunke (11) looks at his options against Douglas Thursday night. Graunke had 14 points in the Senators' loss.
Photo by Jeff Mulvihill, Jr. | InstaImage.
A couple of runs strung together for Douglas High boys basketball Thursday night in its 67-45 win over Carson.
It was a four-point game at the half, 28-24, but the Tigers got rolling in the third quarter powered by a 6-0 run.
The run started with Douglas up one, 30-29, as Douglas got moving in transition for uncontested buckets on odd-man chances.
Thomas McDowell knocked down the first bucket before Dakota Jones got free for another.
Kasen Boggs followed that with a transition jumper to make it, 36-29, Douglas.
The scoring pace continued for the Tigers as Chris Smalley hit a corner triple after swatting a ball off the backboard on the other end.
JC Reid added a 3-pointer of his own from the wing to push Douglas’ margin to 44-33.
Theo Reid ended the third quarter with three points the hard way, converting an and-one opportunity.
Smalley, who finished tied for the team-high with 16 points, added five more to open up the fourth quarter.
Tack on another Boggs triple and Douglas’ lead had ballooned to 20, 55-35.
Both Boggs and Douglas head coach Corey Thacker thought the confidence shifted for the Tigers from the defensive end.
“We’re aggressive up there. We like to jump lanes and sometimes we get burned, but tonight it worked,” said Boggs, who also scored 16 points to go along with eight assists and six steals.
“Defensive intensity. We changed some things and the kids made the adjustments. Really we just executed,” said Thacker.
With two minutes remaining in regulation, Douglas had put together a 35-11 run from the 30-29 mark midway through the third quarter.
First 16 minutes
A three-minute stretch of the second quarter featured most of the scoring in the first half between the two rivals.
Smalley hit a putback basket to make it 14-13 Tigers before a 10-9 scoring run for both teams that spanned less than 180 seconds.
Carson’s Brandon Graunke drilled two triples in the first quarter, leaving it to Parsa Hadjighasemi to take over the load from beyond-the-arc.
The senior combo guard drilled a wing 3-pointer off an assist from Graunke before finding himself open in the corner for a second triple.
Douglas found the final two scores of the opening half as Theo Reid deposited an easy interior basket.
On Douglas’ next trip down the floor, Boggs dished his third assist of the first half to Connor Ward for a mid-range jumper.
Hadjighasemi ended the night with 15 points for Carson while Graunke added 14 of his own.
The Senators next leading scorer had five points.
A physical affair, Carson High head coach Jordan Glover thought the Senators let the moment get away from them.
“We have it in us. As a group, when we have some adversity we don’t know how to handle it,” said Glover. “We expect calls instead of earn calls. … We let that bother us.”
Glover had plenty of praise for his team in the opening 20 minutes, but knows if the Senators want to be playoff bound they’ll have to find ways of putting together a 32-minute game.
UP NEXT: Douglas (11-6, 6-3 in Class 5A North) will host Damonte Ranch (6-9, 4-5) Friday night, looking to avenge an overtime loss to the Mustangs earlier in the season.
Carson’s (7-10, 3-6) gauntlet week continues, as the Senators will head home to host the North’s top team in Spanish Springs (13-5, 9-0).
