Sheetz Holiday Christmas Classic: High Point Central vs Southwest Guilford

The 2nd round of the Sheetz Holiday Classic featured a clash of conference foes, the Bison of High Point Central and the Cowboys of Southwest. Central came into tonight’s contest coming off a hard fought come back victory over Thomasville, while the Cowboys remained perfect on the year by beating Westchester Country Day last night. The gym was packed to watch this dog fight, and it turned out to be a sloppy and extremely ugly ball game.

Southwest started out with scoring the first 5 points, but Central responded well. After trading baskets, Southwest scored the final 5 of the quarter to finish the 1st at 15-7.

The second quarter was an ugly affair with the Cowboys turning it over a total of 13 first half turnovers and poor shot selection allowed the Bison to out play and out hustle the hosts and cut the lead to 32-27 at the break.

Unfortunately the second half was just as ugly with both teams struggling to do anything with the Bison winning the frame 9-7.

So headed into the tightly contested fourth SW held a slim 39-36 lead. The drama began roughly half way through at the 4:33 mark as Central ties it up at 47. After trading missed shots and turnovers, Central took the lead with a basket, but the Cowboys tied it back up at the 2:29 mark. The Bison couldn’t finish the potential 4 point play, but the made basket put them up 52-49 with 1:45 to play. Another missed shot and another huge bucket by Central gave them their largest lead at 54-49 with only 1:15 to play. A Ben Ferguson 3 from the right corner cut the lead down to 54-52 at 53.8.

Southwest got a stop, ultimately scored a huge 3 from Terrell Leach to take the lead at 55-54. Central cake down and showed no quit by scoring a huge basket to take a 56-55 lead with just 41.0 to go. Southwest came down and drew a foul. DJ Chamblee was able to hit the back end of his 2 shots to tie it up at 56. The Bison wisely threw a full court pass and drew a foul sending them to the charity stripe with only 8.1 on the clock. After missing the first free throw, Central called a timeout.

The Cowboys discussed what to do during the timeout, and gave the Cowboys something to execute in transition. The Bison player was not able to connect on the second as Terrell Leach came up with his eighth rebound on the night and weaved through the defenders and pulled up and drew a shooting foul right before the buzzer. The Senior calmly walked up to the line and swished home the winning free throw to give the Cowboys an ugly win 57-56 to advance to the Sheetz Holiday Classic Championship game for the second straight year.

The Bison were lead by Juwan Foggie (18). Southwest was lead by Terrell Leach with 34 points and 8 rebounds. Southwest will play Western Guilford tomorrow night at 7:30 for the title.

                         1st  2nd  3rd  4th  Final
   High Point Central    07   20   09   20    56
   Southwest Guilford    15   17   07   18    57

High Point Central (4-7): Michal Seals 4, Jamal Thompson 12, Ahmad Langham 3, Jafari Quick 6, Daniel Smith 1, Germaine Pratt 12, Juwan Foggie 18.

Southwest (10-0) (1-0): Terrell Leach 34, KJ Langley 2, 4 Asts, 2 Stls, Ben Ferguson 6, 4 Reb, DJ Chamblee 5, Tyliek Brister 3, 3 Reb, 3 Stls, Michael Bryant 2, Arjun Patel 4, 3 Reb.