
Union’s Nazjier Murphy contests the shot of Lakewood’s J’Kwon McKoy.
Brandt Young|Sampson Independent
In the late slate of an action-packed Tuesday night at Lakewood, the visiting Union Spartans boys’ basketball team took to the court to face off against Lakewood, hoping to topple the Sampson County giant and open their conference play with a win. Unfortunately for the visitors, the home team took the commanding victory after a slow start, 83-37.
Lakewood’s Juan Parker Jr. and Union’s Manny Adams competed for the opening tip, and it was the Spartans who won. Their first possession resulted in a missed layup from Troy Treadwell, and Lakewood came up with an empty possession on the return as well.
Spartan Ayden Wrampe would score the game’s first points on a layup from the low block, but Lakewood’s Cameron Williams would return the favor on the Leopards’ next possession to tie it up. Jaziah Brunson came up with a chase-down block of Adams after Adams took his pass, but Adams would get revenge on a hard block and foul of Brunson at the other end. Brunson stayed down for several minutes as trainers and staff converged on him to check out the injury. The teams took to the sidelines as medical care was given to the injured Leopard.
He was eventually helped to his feet after receiving care for a laceration to his chin and the floor would be cleaned. The teams took back to the court for the remaining 5:18 of the first quarter and subsequent periods. Nathan Pitts would replace the injured Brunson to shoot his foul shots. He made the first to give Lakewood the 3-2 lead. Brunson would not return to the game.
The Spartans grabbed the 4-3 advantage before Lakewood’s Xavier Hall sank a jumper from the right baseline to make it 5-4. John Malahias regained the lead once more for the visiting Spartans at 6-5, but Wrampe fouled Hall on a jumper which he made. The free throw following the foul was no good, but Cameron Williams was fouled on his attempted put-back of the rebound, and he made neither of the two shots to keep the score at 7-6 in favor of Lakewood. Parker would come up with a quick steal and layup, and Hall would block at shot by Myron Sykes at the other end as the Leopards started their defensive attack.
Neither team could find their footing, with Union turning the ball over and Lakewood not being able to capitalize offensively. With 1:30 remaining in the first quarter, Lakewood found themselves with the 14-6 lead, but inefficiently. Hall grew the lead with a fingertip put-in to grow it to a 10-point lead at 16-6, but Mikhail McNeil splashed a three in return to cut it to 16-9. This would be the score at the first intermission.
Dontaveous Smith got payback on the first play of the second quarter with a three of his own, widening it back out to 19-9 nearly immediately. Hall assisted him again on another three in almost the exact same spot, and Parker hit a deep two to go up 24-9. Smith got another bucket and Parker added one from an inbound pass steal, and very quickly the Leopards were leading 28-9 just 1:30 into the second quarter.
The defense from Lakewood was giving no reprieve to the visitors, trapping them up and down the court. Treadwell found an opening at one point though, hitting another triple to make it 28-12 near the five-minute mark. Smith assisted Dashaun Carr on a wide-open long two of his own on the inbound, and Parker added another, giving the home team a 33-12 advantage late in the half.
The points continued to pile on for Lakewood, many of which came from mistakes their opponents made. With three minutes to play in the second, they led 41-12. Adams hit a free throw line jumper t move the score to 41-14, but Xavier Hall answered with his first dunk of the night. Parker fed him on the next possession for another dunk as the game was quickly spiraling out of control for Union.
Adams sank a pair of free throws to close things to a 45-20 lead for Lakewood before halftime.
Lakewood started the second half with reserve players filling the spots on the floor — most noticeably without big men Hall or Williams. Smith got a floater up the right side for the first points and Dashaun Carr got a steal to Nakai Owens for an assist on a wide-open layup, pushing the score to to 49-20 quickly for the hosts. Cameron Williams pushed it to 51-20 shortly after and the lead continued to grow.
Union scored their first points of the quarter on a three, making it a 57-23 game near the halfway point of the third, but the turnovers kept happening and Lakewood kept capitalizing. Treadwell hit another three to move Lakewood’s lead to 63-28 with under two minutes to play in the period, as the Spartans continued to play despite the deficit.
The score sat at 66-30 for the final intermission.
Devin Jones opened up scoring early for the Leopards in the fourth on a put-back from an offensive rebound. Treadwell sank one free throw and collected his own rebound on the second after being fouled by Ayden Melvin. This moved it to a 68-31 lead for Lakewood with less than a minute played in the closing period.
Chris Carr fed Melvin for a layup on the low block to make it an even 70 points for Lakewood. Melvin found himself in multiple statistical categories as he grabbed a block at the other end shortly after his initial basket. Pitts added one point on a free throw for the Leopards and the score sat at 71-33.
Back-to-back triples, the last of which came from Pitts, made it 79-31 with 2:55 to play. Shawn West had a put-back for Union to close the gap by two.
Chris Carr would add a layup and so would West, and the score would go final at 83-37.
“It feels very inspiring,” Lakewood’s head coach, Brandon Powell, said after the team’s dominant performance against their conference rival. “I think the things are starting to come together for the guys. They’re starting to communicate better, they’re starting to make less turnovers. Free throw shooting is still poor, so I’m looking to improve that, but I’m pretty excited with our potential.”
Lakewood moved to 9-1 on the season and opened Carolina 1A conference play at 1-0. Union fell to 3-8 overall and 0-1 in the conference.
Reach Brandt Young at (910) 247-9036, at byoung@clintonnc.com, or on the Sampson Independent Facebook page.