By By ZACH BROOKS
Sports Writer
The Escambia County High School Blue Devils began their week on Thursday night by playing Flomaton in the 2001 County Tournament.
There are four teams in the tournament; W.S. Neal, T.R. Miller, Flomaton, and Escambia County.
The County Tournament is a round-robin tournament. That means that, instead of having a winner's and loser's bracket for teams to play in, every team plays each other and the one who has the winning record wins the tournament.
The Devils game against Flomaton was a very interesting game. Flomaton played a very ball-controlling game, with time of possession heavily in their favor.
The Hurricanes would bring the ball to half-court and then play ball-control and hold the ball for two or three minutes before shooting.
The Hurricanes did that the entire game and it almost worked. The ploy did not work however, and the Hurricanes lost 21-19 in a very low- scoring affair.
The Hurricanes strategy threw the Devils off at first, and the Canes built a 4-1 lead heading into the second quarter.
The Devils buckled down on defense in the second quarter, holding Flomaton to zero points for the quarter. The Devils meanwhile, scored seven points in the quarter to take an 8-4 lead into half-time.
The Devils nor the Canes fared any better in the third quarter, as both teams scored just 4 points for the entire quarter. The Devils scored two and the Canes scored two, so they still clung to their meager four point lead.
The fourth quarter was by far the most thrilling quarter off the night for both teams. The Canes scored 11 points in the quarter while the Devils could only muster seven.
But with just a few seconds left on the clock, Flomaton still trailed the Devils by three. Then C.J. Williams knocked down a monstrous three-pointer to take the game into overtime.
During the first overtime, both teams played stout defense but could not get anything going on offense. After the first overtime the score was 19-19, taking them into a double overtime.
The Devils finally pulled out the win in the second overtime with a two points performance to get the 21-19 victory.
"Their coach did what he had to do to win,"ECHS Head Coach Jerry Smith said. "He knew that his team could not hang with us so he tried to slow the game down, and he almost won."
Barrett Finney lead the Devils in points with 11. Jeremy McCants followed with five points in the win. Kenneth Clark lead the Devils in rebounds with six.
The Devils next game was against the W.S. Neal Eagles Friday night in Flomaton. The Blue Devils crucified the Eagles 71-31, in a game that was never close.
The rout began in the first quarter, with the Devils building up a 17-8 lead by quarters end.
The Blue Devils jumped ahead by 23 points after a 21 points explosion in the second quarter. The explosion gave the Devils a 38-15 lead going into halftime.
The third quarter was a little slower for the Devils as they slowed down the tempo of the game to take some time off the clock. The Devils still outscored the Eagles 12-9 for the quarter however to build their lead to 50-34 going into the final period.
The Blue Devils put their finishing touches on their rout by scoring 21 points in the final period. James Wilson was a catalyst for the scoring in the final period by knocking down three three-pointers to help the Devils win 71-31.
"We are getting a lot better," Coach Smith said. "But we have not played a complete game yet."
" We had a bad night shooting foul shots, and from the floor," Coach Smith said. The Devils shot 43% from the floor on 29/70 shooting, and 37% from the foul line on 8/22 shooting.
Layton Knight led the Devils in points with 18. He helped the Blue Devils build their 23 point lead before half-time, with 12 points in the first half.
James Wilson followed Knight in points with 17 points on the night. Barrett Finney also had 16 points and six rebounds in the romp.
Steve Moore led the Blue Devils in rebounding with nine rebounds.
The Blue Devils next game will be against T.R. Miller on Saturday night in the last game of the County Tournament.