AMHERST, N.H. – In New Hampshire high school basketball, as long as a ballhandler not in the backcourt and is within six feet of an opponent, they can just stand around indefinitely. If anyone forgot that fact, they only needed to head to Souhegan High School on Friday night.
Manchester West proved that it can go at breakneck speed or a dead stop in their 46-37 win against Souhegan, highlighted by a third quarter that saw just one shot between both sides.
Heading out of the half with a tenuous 26-23 lead, West junior Carson Filiardo brought the ball back into play to start the third quarter and did not attempt to even pass the ball for almost two minutes as Souhegan sat back in its zone defensive, waiting for Filiardo to either penetrate to the hoop or look for an open teammate or…well, just do something.
Both sides saw West’s explosive tempo on defense and offense in the first half and Souhegan felt it was worth the risk to not defend man-to-man against the quicker Blue Knights. Likewise, West felt that it was worth the risk to wait until Souhegan’s discipline wavered and a defender would stray out of position since they held the lead and they could prevent the Sabers from offensive opportunities if they just kept the ball until they saw a shot of their choosing.
Filiardo would make the only shot of the quarter, a three-pointer with eight seconds left that finished the bizarre chess match.
West Head Coach Justin Gorham felt that Friday’s game was an example of why New Hampshire possibly should have a shot clock. But, until that day comes, the lack of a shot clock allowed this unique strategy that played to his squad’s strengths.
“Unless we can get down the floor before they can set up in that zone, that makes it very difficult,” said Gorham. “If we got up by three, we told the kids coming out at halftime as soon as you inbound the ball, you hold it until they start playing man-to-man.”
In the fourth quarter, Souhegan had to return to the quicker tempo in the hopes of finding baskets of their own and the Blue Knights returned to their deadly accuracy from the beyond the arc, adding a trio of three-pointers in addition to their five earlier in the game.
Freshman phenom Kur Teng had three of those threes on the way to lead the Blue Knights with a 17-point night and all of Curtis Redd’s 12 points came from deep, but Gorham stressed his belief that any member of his squad can have a hot shooting hand from downtown at any time.
“That’s just what we do, we’re a three-point shooting team,” he said. “That’s our thing, volume shooting. Get open and take a three. Anybody.”
Filiardo also had 13 points on the night for West. Souhegan’s Matthew McCool led all scorers with 23 points on the night.
West (2-0) now faces Hollis-Brookline at home on Tuesday. Souhegan (1-1) will try to rebound at home next Friday against John Stark. Both games are set to start at 6:30 p.m.
On the girls’ side, West returned to the Queen City on Friday night with a 2-1 record following a 31-17 victory against Souhegan.
West held the Sabers to just two points in the first quarter, and Souhegan’s 2-for-6 performance at the line in the second quarter allowed the Blue Knights to build an 18-10 lead heading into the half.
The Sabers missed five of their six free throws in the third quarter and couldn’t find much from the floor, something Souhegan Head Coach Mike Vetack felt stemmed from a lack of aggressiveness shown by his squad.
“We’ve struggled the whole season, our shots aren’t falling,” he said. “We were working on it against their zone, hopefully we can improve on that.”
Neither team had a scorer in double digits, with West sophomore Olivia Culver and West junior Abuk Teng each finishing with nine points.
West next heads to Hollis-Brookline on Tuesday 6 p.m. matchup while Souhegan will host ConVal half an hour later.
