By FRANZ BEARD
Sports Editor
Daily Commercial
January 14, 1976
Sports Editor
Daily Commercial
January 14, 1976
GAINESVILLE - Those guys who play for the Leesburg High Yellow Jackets probably have vapor trails following them when they're on the basketball court.
They probably have a temperature of 78.6 while the other guys are playing with a normal temperature of 98.6.
They keep their cool under pressure, that's for sure, and the Eastside Rams found that out first hand, Tuesday night, when the Jackets maintained their poise and confidence despite tremendous full court pressure.
The Jackets cool under duress earned them a hard fought, 67-57 victory over the Rams in a Big Sun Conference game and it kept the Jackets conference record perfect at 6-0.
Overall, it was the ninth win in 10 games for the Jackets, who are ranked fifth in the state AAA poll. The win enhanced the Jackets chances of moving up in the poll next week, also as, third ranked Ocala Vanguard lost to Gainesville Buchholz.
"We didn't crack under their pressures," said Leesburg coach Woody Clymer. "I was real pleased with the way the boys maintained their cool because it would have been easy for them to fold, Eastside put a lot of pressure on them in the last two quarters."
Several times during the third and fourth quarters, the Rams made strong moves to overcome the Jackets lead, but each time, the Jackets maintained their poise and in fact, became even more patient.
Eastside used a double teaming defense throughout the game and the Jackets consistently found the open man under the basket for the easy shot.
"I was real pleased with our passing game," said Clymer. "especially the passing of Ed (Chatman), Wayne (Hamilton) and Dan (Oliver) inside. It's not often you'll see three inside men pass the ball around like they did tonight. They just kept finding the open man and they really complemented each other with their passing. I don't know how many shots they set up for each other."
Hamilton and Chatman were the big guns for the Jackets with 25 and 20 points respectively, and Oliver added eight more, all but two on follow-ups underneath.
Again, the Jackets played sterling defense and saw it pay off. The Jackets played the majority of the game in a match-up zone and it forced the Rams to do the majority of their shooting way out of range.
"I really don't like zones," said Clymer, "but I don't like having my big men in foul trouble, either. I was afraid that with Eastside's quickness that Ed and Wayne might get in early foul trouble, so we went with the zone and all the boys did a good job in it. It kept Wayne, Ed and Dan in close for the rebounds and the way Eastside goes to the boards, its a good thing they were right there."
Chatman and Hamilton also did a fine job of cutting off the inside play with their shot blocking. Each blocked five shots and they intimidated the Rams out of several others. Rodney Colden also turned in a fine defensive job on high scoring Lorenzo James.
"Defense will win for you," said Clymer. "That's been a key for us this year because we've really been consistent on defense."
Offensively, the Jackets weren't really consistent throughout the night but they had spurts in which they were simply awesome and those spurts allowed them to cruise through a couple of cold spells without much trouble.
The Jackets fell behind, 6-2, in the first quarter, but they came back with nine straight points, with Hamilton getting five of them. Eastside made a run at the Jackets in the final minute of the quarter, but Leesburg held on to lead, 15-14 at the quarter break.
The Jackets played in spurts in the second quarter as well. An early spurt of eight points, six by Hamilton, and two by Chatman, enabled the Jackets to take a 23-18 lead, then after a mild cold spell when the Rams cut the lead to 25-24, the Jackets made another run and poured in eight straight to take a 33-24 halftime lead.
Chatman scored the first four points of the second half before the Jackets went on another cold spell. During a two minute span the Jackets couldn't find the range while Eastside, led by Lorenzo and Vernon James, hit for nine straight to cut the Jacket lead to four.
It remained a four point game until the final minute of the quarter when Oliver, Hamilton and Chatman scored six straight points. The Jackets led 47-39 going into the final period.
The Jackets maintained their advantage despite Eastside's full court press in the fourth quarter by going to Hamilton and Chatman underneath. The Rams had a chance to cut the Leesburg lead to three with just over a minute to go but Lorenzo James blew a layup after a steal at midcourt and the Jackets converted that miss into a bucket and a seven point lead.
"I'm really proud of our boys," said Clymer. "I think we showed more poise throughout the game and we were better with our fundamentals. We didn't take the bad shots and we really worked the ball to the open man, especially down there at the end when we were in our delay game. The kids really played unselfishly."
The Jackets visit Ocala Forest, Friday Night.
LEESBURG (67) - Peeples 0 0-0 0; Colden 4 2-5 10; Chatman 9 2-2 20; Hamilton 12 1-5 25; Oliver 4 0 -0 8; Williams 0 0-0 0; Farrior 0 0-0 0; Walker 2 0-0 4;
TOTALS 31 5-12 67
EASTSIDE (57) - Matthews 2 0-0 4; V. James 5 0-2 10; L. James 9 1-4 19; Bryan 2 0-0 4; Wilson 2 2-3 6; Gillus 1 0-0 2; Sherman 4 0-4 8; Hudson 2 0-0 4;
TOTALS 27 3-13 57
LEESBURG 15-18-14-20--67
EASTSIDE 14-10-15-18--57
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