YATES CENTER — Just how smothering was Uniontown High’s pressure defense Tuesday?
Rumor had it, by the end of the first quarter the Eagles’ defenders could accurately tell which flavor of gum Yates Center High players had been chewing.
Uniontown took control from the outset, forcing a flurry of turnovers and hurried Yates Center shots through a 34-point outburst that stretched into the second quarter.
The press was so devastating that Wildcat head coach Lane Huffman was forced to call three of his five allocated timeouts within the first two minutes of the contest.
The Eagles cruised from the dominant start to win, 52-24, in the final game of the pre-Christmas break.
Yates Center returns to action Jan. 9 at Southeast-Cherokee.
“If we play like we did in the second half, we’d have been just fine,” Huffman said. “We knew they were gonna press. We just weren’t ready for it.”
The Eagles led 22-0 after one quarter, and were doing much the same in the second period before Yates Center found a working strategy.
“We wanted to do the pick and roll in the first half, figuring they’d have trouble with it,” Huffman said. “‘Turns out, they defended it very well. They were so aggressive, so we started looking for backdoor stuff.”
Yates Center was able to convert several back-door passes to players cutting behind the Eagle defenders, converting a number of layups in the third and fourth quarter.
But it was too little, too late.
“We’ve just gotta be focused out of the gates,” Huffman said. “The theme for us is that it takes us a quarter or two to settle down.”
Deveraux Sarchet led Yates Center with 10 points. His bucket with about 3½ minutes left in the half ended the Wildcat scoring drought.
Yates Center trailed 38-5 at halftime.
He scored six more in the third quarter against a mixture of Yates Center starters and reserves.
