Hot shooting Rams pull away for win over New Kent

New Kent's Ethan Ashford (5) tussles with Lafayette's Keshawn Jefferson for control of a loose ball. Ashford won the battle.

Alan Chamberlain

Shooting at a 61 percent clip from the floor in the first half, Lafayette’s Rams built a 20-point lead on New Kent’s host Trojans. After the break, the hosts managed to cut the deficit in half but no closer as the Rams held on for an 82-63 win.

Thursday’s Senior Night contest closed out the regular season for the Trojans, who are 9-13 entering post-season play in next week’s 3A Conference 25 tournament. New Kent is seeded third, earning a quarterfinal home match with Poquoson next Tuesday at 6 p.m.

If the Trojans win Tuesday, they advance to play in Thursday’s semifinal round at second-seeded Colonial Heights, which has a first round bye. In the other bracket, top-seeded Park View-South Hill awaits a Thursday semifinal encounter with the winner of the other Tuesday quarterfinal featuring fourth-seeded Warhill and fifth-seeded Southampton.

(New Kent’s Lady Trojan basketball team is seeded sixth in the girls’ conference tourney and plays Tuesday at 6 p.m. at third-seeded Poquoson.)

Senior Night for the Trojans did not end on a happy note although the five seniors who started (Ethan Ashford, Justin Cox, Cameron Downer, Darren McCaughan, and Kenny Woodley) opened the game in positive fashion. Scoring often in transition, that combo beat the Rams to basket on the way to an 8-5 lead.

But the Rams, and guard Timmy Woollum in particular, countered from behind the three-point arc. Woollum buried three straight to put his team in front to stay.

Heading into the second quarter, the Rams led 22-16. New Kent leading scorer Kyle Claytor rallied the hosts with back-to-back threes, closing the gap to 24-22. But the visitors sank eight-of-10 shots from the floor to pull away, and the Trojans could not keep pace.

“[Lafayette] shot the lights out right in our face. They were scorching,” said New Kent coach Ronnie Cox.

“We played pretty respectably and much better than the last time [at Lafayette],” he said. “We cut it to 10, but we were not able to finish it out. But we didn’t roll over and didn’t quit, and in a game like this that’s all you can ask.”

Lafayette owned a 49-29 halftime advantage. The Trojans closed within 12 in the third quarter and twice were within 10 in the fourth, once on a Jared Lugg trey and again on an Amari Brown lay-in, but could not draw closer.

Claytor led all scorers with 26 points. Cox finished with 14 followed by C.J. Reeders’ six, Brown’s five, and four each from Lugg, McCaughan, and Woodley.

Lafayette placed five players in double figures led by Woollum’s 18 points.