Seniors lead as Falcons and Lady Falcons soar past Marlboro County rivals
By Drake Horton
Contributing Writer
It was a sweet senior night for the both the Darlington Falcons and Lady Falcons basketball teams this past Friday as both came out victorious over Marlboro County in front of a packed home crowd.
Darlington (boys) 68, Marlboro County (boys) 56
On a night where seniors were honored, it was only fitting that it would be seniors leading the way for the Darlington Falcons win over the Marlboro County Bulldogs.
Behind senior Kenynon Scott’s 19 points and senior Ty Johnson’s 18 points, the Falcons got back to their winning ways with a 68-56 win over the Bulldogs.
Scott and Johnson were not the only players to have a significant impact in the game, however. Seniors Malik Cooper and Silas Barr also provided some much-needed help to go along with the rest of the Falcons bench.
“I am glad tonight we were led by seniors,” Darlington boys’ head coach Anthony Heilbronn said after the game.
“Malik Cooper, normally a bench guy, had seven. Silas Barr gave us really good minutes inside; he boarded. It was nice. We got some bench help tonight for once; we haven’t had it in a while. So for them to respond, Peanut (Brian Robinson) had five, it was a nice change of pace. We needed it tonight and they brought that energy.”
Darlington’s 12-point victory did not come without its challenges. After a lackadaisical first quarter, the Falcons were in complete disarray in the second quarter and on the verge of a blowout, trailing 28-19, when Heilbronn called a timeout with 2:33 left before the half.
That timeout proved to be the true turning point of the game as the Falcons came out of the timeout a completely different team, going on a 14-3 run spanning between the second and third quarter that saw a once 28-19 deficit turn into a 35-31 Darlington lead.
“I basically challenged them. I said, ‘Do you want to be here or not?’” Heilbronn said. “We are going through the motions; two or three of you look like you don’t even want to be here, so if that’s the case, when we go into the locker room, take your jersey off, leave it and don’t come back. I said we need people that want to be here so at halftime I reiterated that, that I wasn’t kidding and they bought in and came out and had a really great third quarter.”
A big reason for Darlington’s resurgence, especially in the third quarter, was predicated on its defense. It switched to a zone press and that completely disrupted Marlboro County, forcing the Bulldogs into bad shots and multiple turnovers.
“With certain teams it doesn’t lend itself to it, but we knew, I had watched film from them with Cheraw and Myrtle Beach and we knew they struggled with pressure so when we went to that zone press, that’s not designed for turnovers, it’s just to slow them down, a change of pace and it worked, it created turnovers so we stayed in it,” Heilbronn said.
The win was much needed as the Falcons had dropped their first region game of the year earlier in the week to North Myrtle Beach.
Darlington is now 17-3 overall, 4-1in the region and sitting on top in first place.
Darlington (girls) 56, Marlboro County (girls) 47
The Darlington Lady Falcons picked up a much-needed region win over the Marlboro County Lady Bulldogs on senior night, winning 56-47.
Down 4-0 early in the game, the Lady Falcons went on an 11-0 run and from there never relinquished the lead on their way to the win.
Darlington had a strong finish in the second quarter, maintained in the third and weathered a barrage of three-pointers from the Lady Bulldogs in the fourth quarter by going on an 8-0 run and executing great ball movement in the final couple minutes of the game.
“I’m proud of my girls, on how we competed and how we brought the win home to Darlington tonight,” Darlington girls’ head coach Brad Knox said. “They battled through adversity, they could have quit, they could have laid down when Marlboro County was trying to make a run, but we used our timeouts correctly tonight as a coaching staff. We tried to calm them down because at the end of the day the time was on our side so all we had to do was take care of the ball and make good decisions.”
Up by three at the end of the first quarter, Lady Bulldogs did tie the game once in the second quarter, but they were never able to retake the lead and the Lady Falcons finished the quarter on a 7-0 run to go into the half up by seven.
The action really did not pick up again until the fourth quarter. Marlboro County got hot, hitting four three-pointers in the quarter, but an 8-0 run by the Lady Falcons in the middle of the final period along with great ball movement in the final two minutes were just too much for the Lady Bulldogs to overcome.
Darlington is 9-7 overall, 2-3 in the region.
