Depleted roster forces Charles City into uphill battle against King William

Charles City’s Joseph Simms (left) unleashes a hook shot for a score over King William’s Jalen Wimmer.

Robb Johnson photo

With a depleted roster on hand and facing a King William Cavaliers’ team that was much better than their record showed, Charles City’s Panthers struggled on offense as they fell 79-57 in the Jan. 24 contest.

Jalen Wimmer’s trifecta started the scoring for the visitors in the contest. Charles City responded as Taylor Bey scored the next four points. A technical foul assessed to the King William bench allowed Jonlei Coles to sink two free throws to spark a 7-0 run by the Panthers.

King William responded with a 5-0 run before Jonlei Coles converted two baskets form the charity stripe. But the Cavaliers pushed forward to take a 22-21 lead after the first quarter. That lead only grew for the visitors throughout the rest of the game as easy scores from King William resulted in the lead reaching double figures by the halftime break and ballooning over 20. The Panthers couldn’t get any closer the rest of the way as they dropped the contest.

Charles City Head Coach De’Quantae Mason talked about his team’s effort despite the difficult circumstances.

“We haven’t been able to get a good practice in because we have had people sick and injuries,” he said. “Regardless, we need to show better effort than what we did tonight. We had a gameplan and just didn’t execute it.”

Coles and Bey led Charles City (7-7) in double figures respectively with 22 and 19 points. Gavin Stewart pumped in six, Joseph Simms added four, and the duo of Christian Holloway and Deshaun Greene tossed in three apiece.