Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, January 29, 1994 TAG: 9401290201
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By BOB TEITLEBAUM STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Only once did he score as many as 20 points as a junior for the Vikings' basketball team. Now he's a routine 20-point scorer, and three times in the past five games Hungate has had 30 or more points.
His latest offensive escapade came Friday at the expense of Lord Botetourt. Hungate started scoring early and wound up with a career-high 34 points as the Vikings led all the way in an 89-76 Blue Ridge District victory at Northside.
The victory kept the Vikings in a virtual tie with Salem for the district lead. The Vikings (13-1 overall, 3-0 Blue Ridge) have one fewer victory than the Spartans, who edged Alleghany 82-77 on Friday.
"My role last year was that we had big men and I had to get assists," said Hungate, one of four seniors for Northside. "This year we have young players. I have to take over and show leadership, get our confidence up."
Hungate said when sophomore point guard Justin Porterfield got in foul trouble, "I stepped up to the dribble [shifting from shooting guard to point guard]."
"Sometimes we try to figure it out as we go along," said Billy Pope, the Vikings' coach.
"Hungate's a great player and he's a winner," said Don Meredith, the Lord Botetourt coach. "If you cut him off one place, he goes another way. He'll run you to death. He ran three of our players to death and I've seen him do it at other places."
Meredith's Cavaliers (7-3, 1-2) never figured it out, though they earned good grades for effort.
Northside started by scoring the game's first 11 points with Hungate getting eight. Botetourt chopped that lead quickly and made a game of it until the Vikings went on a 24-11 run in the first six minutes of the third period to build a 64-47 advantage.
"Our trapping works in spurts and you never know when it's going to happen," Pope said. "In the third quarter, it gave us a nice cushion."
Even after the third quarter, Botetourt made a run, cutting the Vikings' lead to 12 points with barely three minutes left. It was down to 10 with seconds left when Hungate put an exclamation point on the contest by canning his fifth 3-pointer.
For the evening, Hungate hit 10-of-17 from the floor with seven assists and five steals. He attempted seven 3-pointers.
"It's hard to imagine him topping what he did at William Byrd," Pope said of Hungate's 32-point effort in an overtime victory on the Terriers' court this week.
Hungate wasn't the entire story Friday. The Vikings got 14 points from Steve Anderson outside and Maurice Garrison inside.
Jeff Cronise led Botetourt's domination of the boards. He grabbed 20 rebounds to help his team hold a 48-32 advantage. Cronise has 72 rebounds in his past four games.
The Cavaliers' downfall came in turnovers, with 29 miscues to 16 for the Vikings. That wiped out the edge inside.
"If we don't get stripped of the ball the first three times when they hit a 3 and it's 11-0, it's a different game," said Meredith, referring to his team's start.
"Turnovers killed us, but we haven't had much practice lately. We talked about their defense, but you have to show them. We kept letting them take the ball from behind."
Botetourt shot 23-of-54 from the field, with Shannon Williams scoring 23 points on 9-of-18 accuracy. The Vikings were 31-of-63.
by CNB