The first thing York Institute boys’ basketball coach Derwin Wright said before being interviewed after Saturday’s Region 4-AA quarterfinal at Notre Dame was, “This is the loudest gym I’ve ever been in.”
It was much quieter then, a few moments after the Dragons defeated the Irish 66-58 in the high school elimination game.
Region semifinals move to White County High School in Sparta where York (19-12) will play Upperman, which eliminated Sequatchie County 58-53 on Friday.
Notre Dame came in off winning the District 7 tournament and its student section was out in force. With three freshmen in the starting lineup most of the season, the Irish bounced back from last year’s 2-21 record and finished 17-8.
“We really looked like freshmen tonight,” Notre Dame coach Tommy Fox said. “Before in the district tournament we were at Sequatchie and at Grundy, and we were the third seed. No one expected anything from us. Everybody was against us and we played really well. Now we had the bull’s-eye on our back.
“Early on I thought we were tight. I know we missed four or five layups early in the game. We were hurrying on offense. We missed some shots we should’ve made.”
The Dragons managed to keep the game at the slower pace they wanted throughout the first half, which ended with them leading 31-29. Notre Dame began the second half with a 13-5 run.
“I really felt like in the third quarter their pressure got to us,” Wright said. “They sped us up, got us playing full court and that was not the tempo we wanted. We were turning the ball over, or throwing up a silly shot with no rebounder under the basket. We worked some things out at the break between the third and fourth periods. The kids adjusted.”
The Irish led 46-40 late in the third and had a chance to take their largest lead but failed to convert a breakaway after a steal.
“We turned it up and got up by six, then missed a wide-open layup that would’ve made it eight,” Fox said. “They had numbers coming back, made their layup and cut it to four. I think that kind of deflated us a little bit.”
York scored the first six points of the fourth quarter and ended up taking the lead for good at 52-49 on Anthony Williams’ four-point play with 5:11 remaining. Wright’s team played mostly zone defense, but he credited his players’ effort in the man-to-man that held the Irish to three field goals in the fourth quarter — two in the last 24 seconds.
Notre Dame had five score in double figures, but the high was freshman Rashawn Avery’s 11. Freshmen D.J. Bowles and Stedmon Ford had 10 along with Stewart Gunter and Matt Sutton — the team’s only senior.
Cody Stephens scored 16 points for the Dragons. Tyrel Asberry added 14 and Williams totaled 13.