Hobbton boys blow past Spartans

In Monday night’s late slate, the Hobbton boys played host to Union for the first meeting of the season during Hobbton’s senior night festivities. It was the hosts who came out victorious, grabbing the 68-25 win over their visiting Carolina 1A foes.

Union’s Manny Adams and Hobbton’s Chris Davis went head-to-head for the game’s opening possession. While Adams would get his hand on it, possession ultimately went to the Wildcats. They came up empty, though, as did the Spartans on the return, and it was Hobbton’s Deonte Darden who scored the game’s first bucket on a layup.

Troy Treadwell swished a triple for Union’s first points to take the early lead. Ayden Wrampe added a layup through contact to give the visitors the 5-2 lead, but Davis banked in an elbow jumper to return the favor for Hobbton, cutting the deficit to one at 5-4. He then took the lead for the Wildcats on a put-back layup on their next possession.

Wrampe banked home a jumper from an Adams’ assist, momentarily retaking the lead for Union. A connection called out many times in the gridiron for the Wildcats — Joe Corbett to Reggie Thompson — netted the hosts the one-point lead again, and another long two extended it to 10-7 before Union signaled for a timeout with 1:57 to play in the first.

Amir Tate pickpocketed a Spartan pass and took it to the other end for a score, widening the lead for the Wildcats. Richard Simpson hit a fade-away three to end the first over Union’s John Malahias, moving it to a 15-7 lead for the hosts going into the second.

Emari Butler opened the scoring in the second half on a 3-pointer from the right side, and Tate stole an inbound pass for a layup attempt before being fouled, sinking one of his free throws. The Wildcats opened the floodgates of scoring with another triple, jumping out to a 23-7 lead before Adams sank a free throw for the Spartans to grab a point back.

Tate hit a floater across the middle and Corbett stole a pass and took the wide-open layup to give Hobbton the 27-8 advantage with 5:14 left in the half before another Union timeout was called to slow the scoring down.

The full-court press was working in Hobbton’s favor at this point, as the Spartans found themselves double and even triple teamed right after inbounding the ball in the backcourt, leading to many turnovers and minimal time of possession for the visitors.

Tate fought through the contact of Wrampe for another pair of points for Hobton, but couldn’t connect on the free throw. This made it a 30-8 ballgame over halfway through the second.

The score continued to climb for Hobbton, while it stayed stagnant for Union. Back-to-back fouls on Adams didn’t help the Spartans any as he quickly encroached on the five-foul threshold. With 1:01 left in the second, Hobbton had jumped out to a 39-8 lead.

A 40-8 score took the teams into halftime.

Union grabbed the first score of the second half, but a Darden triple over the outstretched hand of Adams got the Wildcats more than enough retribution, making it a 43-10 game quickly. Corbett added a jumper for the hosts, giving them the 35-point advantage as the score quickly moved towards the 40-point threshold for the mercy rule and a running clock.

With under three minutes to play in the third, Hobbton continued their dominating lead, but couldn’t get the elusive mercy rule. A strong finish through contact from Nazjier Murphy gave him a pair of points, but he couldn’t add another on the free throw, with the score staying at 49-16.

By the time the clock showed 1:04 left in the third, the score had moved to 51-17 as the routing was on.

A 34-point lead was taken by Hobbton into the fourth quarter as the Wildcats maintained a 53-19 advantage on their version of senior night.

Davis got a put-bock for Hobbton just 33 seconds into the fourth to extend the home lead even further. Butler added a layup through the paint for another set of double points, making it 57-19 with over six minutes to play.

Wrampe got the Spartans past the 20-point mark, but Simpson added back-to-back layups and a 3-ball to get Hobbton past 60 and the lead past the mercy rule threshold, moving the score to 62-21 to turn on the running clock.

The final buzzer sounded with a 68-25 senior night win for the hosting Wildcats.

Hobbton’s head coach, Ayden Tart, said he and his team have things to focus on as they finish out their regular season this week before heading into the conference tournament next week. “We’re just focusing on energy, attitude, and effort,” he said, in a post-game interview. “After a game like last week (against Lakewood), that’s what we’ve been talking about. And celebrating the seniors — that’s what we did today, so I’m looking forward to the rest of this week and just continuing to get better.”

Union moved to 3-16 overall and 0-8 in the conference. They were set to host Hobbton last night, but the game had not been played as of press time. Hobbton inched closer to .500 with an 8-11 record and 4-4 in the Carolina 1A.