Powerful Neuqua takes it to Bartlett

The Bartlett boys basketball team kept pace with Neuqua Valley for a quarter Thursday night.

The rest of the game belonged to the Wildcats.

Neuqua Valley never trailed, led by as many as 31 points in the fourth quarter and cruised to a 90-63 Upstate Eight Conference victory at Bartlett.

"We got a fast start and knocked down our shots," Neuqua junior Dwayne Evans said. "It's kind of hard for a team to come back for a 10-, 15-point deficit."

The Wildcats (20-1, 5-1 UEC) scored the first 7 points and had an 18-9 lead with 2:15 remaining in the first quarter. Bartlett's Marc Little score the next 6 points in the next 30 seconds to get the Hawks (9-5, 2-2) within 3, 18-15. Bartlett never got any closer.

Neuqua, which won its 12th consecutive game, took a 27-21 lead into the second quarter thanks to 10 of 17 shooting in the opening 8 minutes. Evans led the way with 11 points.

The Wildcats increased the lead to 15, 38-23, 3 minutes into the second after an offensive rebound and putback by Christian Shonkwiler, who had a career-high 14 points off the bench.

"We opened it up a little bit with defense, and played a little better defense in the second quarter," Wildcats coach Todd Sutton said. "The offense was there all night."

Bartlett couldn't keep up. Marc Little, who scored 13 points in the first quarter, went 0 for 4 from the field in the second. The Hawks turned the ball over 8 times and went 5 for 12 in the second.

"I thought what really killed us was we lost our team concept," Bartlett coach Jim Wolfsmith said. "We lost our concept of making the extra pass, of working as a team defensively, of boxing out as a team. And they took advantage of that."

The Wildcats led 50-33 at halftime and 75-46 after three quarters. They did not play a starter in the fourth quarter.

"I'm definitely feeling confident about our team right now," Evans said. "It's a conference game and we had to come out strong. I think we did that."

Derek Raridon, Kareem Ameda and Shonkwiler each had 14 points for Neuqua. Evans finished with 13 points and 11 rebounds. Nolan Brown and Rahjan Muhammad each added 9 points.

Luke Labedzki led the Hawks with 23 points. Little finished with 19. No other Hawks player had more than 6.