MTCS boys hold off Moore County
MURFREESBORO – Much like his role as quarterback of the MTCS football team the past two seasons, senior Justin Winn prefers to distribute the basketball on the hardwood.
On Friday night, he had to take on a scoring role in the fourth quarter to help the Cougars win their fourth in the last five games.
MTCS held off a pesky Moore County 67-59 behind Winn’s 13 fourth-quarter points.
“It’s actually a joke around the team that I don’t prefer to shoot,” Winn said. “I like the assist better. They found me, I guess, and I hit the good shots at the free throw line.
Winn, who was scoreless before the final eight minutes, hit nine of 11 free throws in the last quarter to secure the win.
“That’s sometimes a scary thing for us — free throw shooting contests,” MTCS coach Jason Piercey said. “That’s why he’s good, because he’s solid.
“When he wasn’t here because of football, that’s what we were missing a lot of times. We had a lot of youth out there.”
The Cougars (5-6 overall, 3-2 in District 9-A) started off strong on both ends, grabbing a 14-5 lead at the end of the opening quarter behind post players Luke Howell and Barr Ellenburg.
That, though, was short lived.
Moore County (6-8, 2-3) came back to take a 27-25 lead at halftime.
“You can’t give up 20-point quarters,” Piercey said. “Usually, when you do that you lose. We challenged them at half. We felt if we got the lead, we’d be all right.
“We got lazy in the second quarter. We weren’t defending the ball. We weren’t defending their drives. And we lost our intensity that we had in the first quarter.”
The challenge paid off. Ellenburg, who had nine of his game-high 21 points in the first half, warmed back up in the third quarter. He buried a pair of 3-pointers, the second breaking a 34-all game with 4:05 left. MTCS didn’t trail the remainder of the game.
“When they started pressing us, Justin was just getting people open by penetrating,” Ellenburg said. “That was opening up shots for me and Luke (Howell) and other people.”
Trey Lashlee’s 3-pointer extended the Cougars’ lead to 56-43 with 4:35 remaining before the Raiders responded. Will Slatten’s rebound bucket was followed by James Dougherty’s jumper to trim the Cougars’ lead to 56-47 with 3:05 remaining.
But that’s when Winn took over. Winn scored the Cougars’ final 11 points over the final 2:06 to preserve the victory.
“Every district win is a huge win,” Winn said. “To beat Moore County is always a good win because they are a great team. Even when they are down in talent, they play hard and fight hard. They are a tough team to beat.”
Contact Tom Kreager at 615-278-5168 or tkreager@dnj.com. Follow him on Twitter @Kreager.
MTCS 67, Moore Co. 59
Moore Co. 5 22 12 20 – 59
MTCS 14 11 21 21 – 67
Moore Co.: Blydge Farrar 4, Will Slatten 14, Ryan Northcutt 12, Jay Laymon 4, James Dougherty 6, Doran Noble 5, Jordan Barrier 14.
MTCS: Trey Lashlee 3, Karan Hill 6, Justin Winn 13, Tyler Lamb 2, Joseph Peck 3, Trey Hickey 4, Barr Ellenburg 21, Luke Howell 13, Gavin Burgess 2.