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There was little Steve Yelton could do late in the third quarter when Ron Johnson called for the ball on the block.
When Johnson actually received it?
The odds of containment went out the building.
After Johnson caught the ball, he faked a drop step toward the paint before pivoting back to the baseline and fading back for a soft jump hook that flushed through the net for two of his game-high 18 points.
"I know that I can carry the team," Johnson said. "I wanted the ball, so I called for it."
Through the first four games of the season, the St. Francis (Pa.) recruit has been up-and-down in the scoring column, sometimes effective and sometimes not.
But on Wednesday at Gettysburg High against visiting South Western, there was no question of his ability and it was his rounded game that enabled the Warriors to leave with a 53-41 win.
"Forty-one is a nice number," Warriors head coach Jeff Bair said. "We did well to hold them to 41. If we would have made our easy ones, layups ... it probably would have been 65-30."
While his point total helped, it was Johnson's defensive work that yielded the biggest dividend for Gettysburg (4-0). Johnson had eight blocks in the game, but misdirected many more and frustrated a hard-working Mustang (1-2) team.
The game plan South Western used to start the game was brilliant. Head coach Nathan Brodbeck figured his big men couldn't match up with Johnson, so he pulled them to the baseline and told
That logic was effective in the back-and-forth, high-scoring first quarter when the Mustangs answered bucket for bucket with Gettysburg. Yelton, who finished with 16 points on the night, hit a layup and a jump shot before a 3-pointer pulled the Mustangs to within one point, 13-12.
But Dontez Reid scored 10 unanswered points for Gettysburg in the next 2 minutes, 39 seconds, giving Gettysburg a 23-15 lead after one period.
South Western trailed the Warriors 28-21 at halftime, but was able to string together a 9-3 run to start off the third quarter.
Mustang point guard Greg Hess nailed a pull-up jump shot from the foul line with 3:54 remaining in the frame to cap the run, which ended with South Western trailing 31-30.
But only seconds after the Mustangs pulled back into contention, Johnson and Dontez Reid pushed the lead back up to 10 points. Both hit layups before Johnson fooled Yelton on the block. Reid folllowed with a deep 3-pointer to finish off the 9-0 surge.
"All in all, when we needed a play, someone was able to make it," Bair said.
The game showed, perhaps, the best and worst of Gettysburg. At its best, the defense was so effective it created most of its points off turnovers. But at its worst, and this was something that Bair admitted needed some tweaking, the Warriors' halfcourt offense stalled and allowed South Western back into the game.
"Our halfcourt is probably the weakest part of our game," Bair said. "And the bad thing is that we don't get a lot of practice time right now. One Friday night and three more next week. It's just really hard to collect."
The Warriors will face Red Land on Friday. It's the beginning of one of their hardest weeks of the season. They will face Hershey on Monday, Trinity on Wednesday and finish with Susquehanna next Friday.
Contact Cory Mull at cmull@eveningsun.com.
