Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 4, 1993 TAG: 9303040326
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOHN A. MONTGOMERY SPECIAL TO THE ROANOKE TIMES & WORLD-NEWS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
COLONELS LOOK LIKE CHAMPS, ROUT GW
All the necessary omens were in place.Omen No. 1: William Fleming's opening Northwestern Region boys' basketball tournament game was scheduled Wednesday night against George Washington of Danville, a squad it had crushed twice during the regular season.
Omen No. 2: The afternoon of the game, a minor fire broke out in Fleming's gym.
Omen No. 3: The game was moved across town to rival Patrick Henry's gym, home of the defending Group AAA state champions.
Pick your finish. Fleming played: (a) like it was 30 points better than the Western District regular-season champion; (b) like it was on fire; (c) like it was state-championship material.
You can't miss this question; Fleming played a virtually flawless first half, scoring 58 points, and cruised to a 97-77 victory.
The Colonels dominated the rebounding, ran a nearly unstoppable fast break and sank 57 percent of their field-goal attempts.
Fleming finished with five scorers in double figures, led by Carlos Rhodes' 25 points and Phillip Lacey's career-high 22. Lacey made nine of his 12 shots. Jemare Crump added 16 points.
All five of the Colonels' starters scored in the first four minutes as Fleming opened a 13-9 lead. GW hung close, however, trailing 31-26 at the break.
Fleming forced a flurry of turnovers early in the second period and scored 14 unanswered points in 2:20. Suddenly, the score was 45-26, and the Colonels put it "on cruise."
"Our strength is our transition game," senior center Lacey said.
Fleming (19-5) advances to a game Friday night against Gar-Field, a 64-61 winner over North Stafford. The game will be played at 7 p.m. at the Northern Virginia school in Woodbridge.
"We played extremely well tonight," Fleming coach Burrall Paye said, "until we got 25 points ahead. Then we got a little bit sloppy."
The Colonels actually stretched their lead to 29 points (76-47) with two minutes left in the third quarter. But GW (15-8), inspired by Eric Carter's 3-pointers and Shadd Breakley's driving scoop shots, closed to 78-60 at the period's end.
The Eagles continued to claw back, closing to 85-70 with just more than five minutes to play.
"I think we started relaxing," said sophomore point guard Derrick Hines, who directed Fleming's attack. "We thought we had the game in the bag."
In the other Northwestern Region game involving a Timesland team, Eric Webb scored the winning basket at the buzzer to lift Pulaski County past Halifax County 55-53. \
see microfilm for box score