By Jack DaSilva
This past Tuesday night, Buchholz High School hosted the Gainesville High School Hurricanes, ranked second in The Prep Zone Power Poll, in a boys’ basketball city showdown.
The ‘Canes were ranked number four in Class 7A according to MaxPreps and winners of 12 games in a row coming into their match-up with BHS.
That momentum continued as visiting GHS defeated Buchholz, 66-55, to sweep the season series and win for the 18th time in the past 21 games against the rival ‘Cats.
“We had to do a good job on Trent Whittemore,” said Gainesville coach Kelly Beckham, who picked up his 200th GHS victory last Saturday in an overtime win against Kathleen (Lakeland). “He’s a good player and I thought we did. We wanted to be solid on the defensive end and get stops and speed the game up.”
And that’s exactly what the Hurricanes did.
Buchholz gave the Hurricanes a run for their money and kept the pressure on and answered almost every basket early on. It was just a six-point lead for Gainesville at the half.
The home-court advantage certainly helped as well as the gymnasium was at full capacity and the energy from the crowd gave the game a playoff-like atmosphere.
Sophomore Trent Whittemore played exceptionally and led the Bobcats with 16 points but that wasn’t enough to earn the Bobcats a win versus their inner-city rival.
Now at 21-2, Gainesville High School has been on an absolute roll.
The Hurricanes have played extremely well as a team but has found a leader in junior Christian Miller-Cardwell, who was named the Sonic Player-of-the-Game following a game-high 23 points. It was his third postgame award in a week..
With 12 of his 23 points coming in the 4th quarter, Miller-Cardwell played great down the stretch, adding five free throws in the final quarter.
Meanwhile, Buchholz was just 8-of-21 from the free throw line, so coach Bob Horodyski scheduled a 7-8 a.m. free throw practice on Wednesday morning.
“That’s one adjustment we’re going to make,” he said. “We’ve talked about it all year long. You can’t win big games like this if you can’t stand on the free throw line and make free throws.”
Gainesville High School will close out the regular season on Friday against rival Eastside at Santa Fe College, and then turn its attention to the Class 7A-District 4 tournament, which it will host as the No. 1 seed thanks to last Thursday’s win against Vanguard (Ocala). The win by GHS resulted in a district-tie with the Knights and the ‘Canes won the coin toss to determine the No. 1 seed and tournament host.
The Bobcats earned the No. 2 seed in their district.
Buchholz (12-11, 4-4) finished tied for second with Bartram Trail (St. Johns), ensuring the two would face each other in the 8A-District 4 semifinals.
The Bobcats earned the No. 2 seed because it had one more road win than the No. 3 seed Bears. They split the 2-game series with each team winning on their own home court.
This time the rubber match will be played on a neutral court at Creekside (St. Johns).
The winner of the Buchholz-Bartram Trail game will advance to the state playoffs, so it comes down to a one-game season for the Bobcats this Tuesday, Feb. 7, at 6 p.m. If the Bobcats win, they will play for the district championship on Friday night against either Oakleaf (Orange Park) or top-seed Creekside (St. Johns). If they lose, their season is over.
Stay up to date with high school basketball in Gainesville and Ocala this postseason by following The Prep Zone on twitter @ThePrepZone and liking our page on Facebook.
