Miscues lead to Darlington boys squandering game
Darlington’s Tabais Dixon makes a move during a Jan. 10 game against the Marlboro County Bulldogs.
Photo by Drake Horton
By Drake Horton, Contributing Writer
In what may have been one of the strangest games of the season so far, the Darlington Falcons lost Tuesday, January 10 to the Marlboro County Bulldogs 54-46.
For the first three quarters it looked like the Falcons, all while playing maybe their sloppiest game of the year, were going to finish out their non-conference schedule on a high note.
That idea went to the wayside, however, in the fourth quarter as Marlboro County finally started to capitalize on the Falcons numerous mistakes and missed shots.
Down by 10 points entering the final period, Marlboro County opened the fourth quarter on an 11-0 run taking a 44-43 lead, it first lead since the first quarter.
Darlington did not make its first basket of the quarter till the 5:11 mark and it only added one more free throw for an abysmal three total points in the fourth quarter and the Bulldogs finished the final period outscoring the Falcons 21-3.
“(I’m) just very, very disappointed,” Darlington boys head coach Ken Howle said after the game. “We beat this team by 30 points on their court, their court, which is a hard place to play, and we come out played like we did.”
This has been a year of growing pains so far for the Falcons as youth and inexperience have reared their ugly face more than once; in the case of this game it was a little different.
With five players not able to play due to extenuating circumstances the Falcons were out manned, out hustled, and, over all, out played.
From a talent standpoint Darlington was head over heels better than Marlboro County and had already proved that earlier this season, beating the Bulldogs by 29 points in Bennettsville.
Maybe that is why Darlington, despite the complete lack of focus on the court, still only lost 54-46 with five of the Bulldogs final seven points coming from the charity stripe.
Either way, hopefully this is just a bump in the road, a learning experience for a young team that is still learning.
Weekly Recap
The Falcons opened up region play in their other game this week taking on the Crestwood Knights in Sumter Friday; for Darlington the game was a complete success.
After having their worst game of the season the game before, the Falcons rebounded, beating the Knights 55-52, outscoring Crestwood 13-4 in the fourth quarter.
The win improves the Falcons to 9-8 overall, but more importantly to 1-0 in the region.
