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Show East Too Tall For Cats By DAVE WIGHAM Clipper Sports WOODS CROSS -- Fast has a front line, height wise, that makes the University of Utah coaches drool so the Wildcat coaches knew they had to keep Kevin VanUitert in the game for rebounding and scoring. As it turned out Kevin got time on the pine due to foul trouble and the Leopards used their height advantage to take a ten point win over the Cuts. "EAST IS so big and they rebound well" admitted Wildcat mentor Clyde Jackson, "we knew we needed Van out there. We're small with Van in the lineup but without him we're really small and it showed against East." For a while though it looked like the home town Wildcats could pull off an upset as they went out to a 13-6 lead but then the Leopards made some adjustments on defense which enabled en-abled them to creep back into the game. "At first we were able to get the ball inside to Van. which is our strength" offered Jackson, "then they put one guy in front of him and one behind him. We told our kids to move the ball from side to side and be a little patient and we could still get the ball inside. We weren't patient. AT THE other end of the floor the Leopards were displaying an offensive threat that the Wildcats hadn't planned on. With the Wildcats defense collapsing on Reid Monson sophomore sopho-more Josh Grant found himself with open shots. "I'm not kidding anyone when I say that he was taking shots from outside of the 20 foot range, and they were going in. We didn't know Grant was that good of an outside shooter" Jackson moaned. To some observers that looked in the box-score box-score it would appear that Monson didn't play that well but it was his presence that opened up the shooting alley for Grant who responded with 22 points, 16 of them coming in the first half. BY HALFTIME the Leopards, who are now 8-1 on the region standing board, had a six-point six-point lead and they held onto that lead until late in the game when the Wildcats, in an effort to play catchup basketball, had to gamble and foul. East responded well to the pressure and the foul shooting. "We were still close at that point but we had to stop the clock and take some chances of stealing the ball" admitted Jackson, "up till that point I honestly believe the second half was an even ballgame" he added. EAST ENJOYED their height in the second half as they continuely went to the boards hard for second shots at the hoop. The loss left the Wildcat coaches drained. "When you look back at all our close losses and then figure out that we would be sitting great right now if we had won just one of them it gets tough to take" admitted a frustrated Clyde Jackson. Indeed the Cats have lost enough close encounters to age any coach but now they fact the reality of having to beat Davis on Tuesday to get any shot at a playoff for the state event. THE DARTS are the only other team in the region that can come close to the Wildcats in the number of close ballgames. If these two clubs continue their ways then you can be sure that one point will decide the outcome of their game on Tuesday. |