Cardinals again get better of Wolverines in border rivalry

LANDRUM – Polk County guard Jamal Wheeler had two second-quarter dunks Saturday at Landrum.

The first punctuated a 7-0 Polk run to cut Landrum’s 21-10 first-quarter lead to 21-17. The second simply dropped a 17-point Cardinal edge to 15 just before halftime.

The Landrum flurry in between the two slams ultimately meant an eighth straight loss for Polk County, the Wolverines falling 83-54 to the Cardinals before a large, boisterous crowd that witnessed Landrum’s fourth straight win in the series.

Beating a Landrum team, now 11-3, on its home floor was always going to be a challenge for Polk County (3-11). But the 20-5 run the Cardinals assembled in the second period proved too much for the Wolverines to overcome. Eight of those 20 points came at the foul line, and given a first quarter in which Polk was whistled for seven fouls to Landrum’s one, perhaps it became understandable that the Wolverines lost a bit of composure in the period.

“I was really happy with our effort and our focus pretty much the first half,” said Polk County head coach Josh McEntire. “We’re down (21-17), two or three calls go against us and we lost our cool and let them get a run. That was the turning point of the game. We never got back in touch with them.”

Polk County did have one final flurry left, slowly trimming a deficit of more than 20 points to 15 at 55-40 on another Wheeler dunk with 2:05 left in the third period. But Landrum scored the final seven points of the quarter to make it 62-40, then pushed the lead past 30 points at times in the fourth period.

“They’re a good team. They’re better than us,” McEntire said. “We were going to have to play perfect basketball to beat them.”

Polk held its own with the Cardinals early in the game until Landrum reeled off the final seven points of the first period for its 21-10 lead.

Daniel Painter opened the second period with a 3-pointer, Jaymes Wingo scored off an offensive rebound and Wheeler had his first dunk to make it 21-17 at the 6:42 mark of the second. A Wes Mullis free throw a minute later, after a Landrum basket, made it 23-18, but the Cardinals then scored the next nine points for a 32-18 bulge with 3:13 left.

Wheeler stopped the run with a layup, but Tre Smith buried his second 3-pointer of the quarter to make it 35-20. Landrum still led by 15, 41-26, at the half.

Wheeler had 15 points to lead Polk County, with Painter adding 10. Foster Bridges scored 19 points and Smith had 15 to lead Landrum.

The rest of the scoring for Polk County, which hosts Hendersonville on Friday:

Wes Mullis 8, Dillion Overholt 6, Jaymes Wingo 4, Jaylon Botranger 3, Malik Miller 2, Holden Owens 2