Saints Fly Past Century Mark in Opening Win
KSCB News - October 31, 2015 6:40 am
Anyone who wondered if this season would be a repeat of the 2014-2015 season for the Seward County Saints can put those thoughts to bed tonight after the Saints opened their 2015-2016 campaign with an eye-popping 124-67 win Friday night over Fort Carson Army Base in their annual Pepsi Classic in the Greenhouse.
After sitting out last year with an injury, 2014 Saints All-American Niem Stevenson was itching to get back on the court Friday and it showed as the redshirt sophomore star scored 20 points in the first 7:30 of the game to blow the game open early for Seward 25-3 against Fort Carson. Stevenson’s new sidekick Charles Beauregard was not to be outshined in his Seward debut however as the feisty Texan put on a show himself, extending the Saints lead to 34-5 at the 9:31 mark of the half after scoring his 11th and 12th points in the early going at the free throw line. Fort Carson finally showed some fight in the later part of the half, but an alley oop dunk from Matthew Lewis to Stevenson with 25 seconds remaining in the first half sent the Saints to the locked room with a commanding 59-29 lead.
In the first half, Seward put on a show offensively, hitting on 52% from the field while also holding Fort Carson to just 35% from the floor. Stevenson nearly had Fort Carson outscored by himself in the first 20 minutes, putting up 23 points on 10 of 14 shooting for the Saints.
The second half began much as the first did, with the Stevenson and Beauregard show. The Saints pair helped Seward extend their lead to 72-38 early in the period and took an 88-53 lead on back to back threes from Delano Jones and Mitchell Packard with just over 10:00 to go in the contest. The Saints eclipsed the century mark with well over 6:00 remaining, taking a 101-56 lead on another Jones bucket and got a breakaway dunk from Jeromie Simmons to but the icing on the cake in the final minute to blow away Fort Carson 124-67 for an opening night win.
The Saints finished the night shooting a paltry 57% from the field and 35% from downtown and also impressed at the free throw line, making 21 of 27 tries, good for 78%. Seward held Fort Carson to just 37% shooting and forced 27 turnovers on the night.
Individually, Stevenson and Beauregard led the way for Seward. In his first game since March of 2014, Stevenson poured in a cool 30 in 27 minutes of work while Beauregard showed Saints fans what to expect from him this season with 23 points and a game high 14 rebounds in the win. Overshadowed by the big numbers put up by Stevenson and Beauregard, Saints guards Marcus Mathieu and Mitchell Packard also had nice opening nights for Seward. Mathieu scored 15 in his first game in green and white while Packard, the lone holdover from Seward’s ’14-’15 squad, scored a career high 16 points and also had a career high seven rebounds.
The Saints win their opener for the first time in three seasons and will look ahead to On Point Academy who they will take on Saturday night at 7:00 on day two of the Pepsi Classic in the Greenhouse.
SEWARD COUNTY/FORT CARSON BOX SCORE<http:
Roy Allen
