Carvers Bay girls cruise past shorthanded Green Sea Floyds

Going up against a shorthanded Green Sea Floyds squad Friday night, Carvers Bay girls basketball coach Issiah Tucker didn’t have to lean on his seniors to get the job done.

Instead, junior Angel Holmes took over.

Holmes had a game-high 20 points, and the Bears got out to a hefty 23-point halftime advantage before taking down the Trojans for a 58-28 road victory.

“She stepped up,” Tucker said of Holmes. “And she didn’t even play in the fourth quarter.”

Holmes played a big part in Carvers Bay taking advantage early. After taking a 5-4 advantage, the Bears went on a 16-1 run – in which Holmes had 13 points – to run away with it.

“That was real big,” Tucker said of the run. “We needed that because I didn’t want to press them in the second half. We needed to get out to a big lead so I could play the whole team.”

Carvers Bay seniors LaQuasha Coles and Anatashia Bromell scored eight and nine points, respectively.

“We have to play like a team, first of all. I feel like we did good at that tonight,” Coles said. “We’re just trying to keep it going so we can accomplish our goals.”

Neither Holmes, Coles nor Bromell played much in the second half as Tucker wants them fresh for Saturday’s Region VIII-A contest against Hemingway.

“We have a game tomorrow and we need to win that, so I tried not to have [my starters] play a lot of minutes to keep them fresh for that one,” Tucker said. “… I wasn’t expecting to be able to play my bench as much as I did with how good [Green Sea Floyds is].”

Meanwhile, there wasn’t much Trojans coach Tracy Kienast could do with two starters and three bench players inactive Friday. Star forward Quadasia Gillard and senior Courtnee Faulk were both missing from the starting lineup, and also missing were freshman Laura Black, senior Jheanelle Goodwin and junior Zikeyah Johnson.

“We were just trying to survive tonight,” Kienast said. “We fought hard in the first quarter, but then the experience of [Carvers Bay] took over and they were able to pull away. Only having three starters playing wore us down, but they played hard and fought until the end. Even when the subs were in, we were down by 40 and cut [our deficit] to 30. So we survived, but we’re still banged up.”

With all the injuries, Kienast had to bring up three players from the Trojans’ JV squad earlier in the week. Sophomore Octavia Lowman, sophomore Alelea McCall and freshman Denisha Pace all played their first varsity game Friday and, while none of them scored, they provided some bodies for Kienast.

“[Gillard] pulled some rib muscles, and I only had five varsity girls tonight,” he said. “Hopefully it’s nothing too serious for Quadasia and we’re hoping she’ll be back next week. Still, it’s no excuse; [Carvers Bay] is awesome and it’s hard to even try to keep up with them when you’re shorthanded like we were tonight.”

Sophomore point guard Tamara Jackson poured in a team-high 16 points, and freshman Jalinda Johnson scored seven for Green Sea Floyds.

“They had a lot of kids out tonight,” Tucker said of the Trojans. “They were looking for some of their younger girls to step up, while we could rely on our upperclassmen. I think they still did a good job for what they had.”

Friday’s game was also Green Sea Floyds’ fourth game in eight days, which took its toll on the squad.

“It’s been a long week for us,” Kienast said. “We’re just trying to get healthy.”

In the meantime, Carvers Bay will be halfway done with its region slate after Saturday’s game with Hemingway.

“We feel good with where we’re at,” Tucker said. “We’re first place in the region, but we have to stay strong and take it one game at a time. There’s still some tough games and teams to play, so we’d like to finish out strong.”

This story was originally published January 29, 2016 at 10:43 PM with the headline "Carvers Bay girls cruise past shorthanded Green Sea Floyds."