Carrollton, Ga. – November, 18, 2005 – The Lane Dragons kept things close early, but the West Georgia Braves proved to be too powerful on the evening, beating the Dragons 91-65 in Cleveland, MS on the campus of Delta State.
Even though the Braves scored 91 points in the contest, it was the defense that spurred the Braves in the first half.
West Georgia came out sluggish, falling behind 5-2 early. The Braves finally caught Lane at 15-15 and took the lead at 20-17 on the shooting of Andrius Petkunas and Ramon Sims. Petkunas led UWG with 13 points in the opening half.
The Braves lead teetered between six and eight points for much of the first half. But with the score 29-23 and with 3:16 left in the opening period, Michael McCowan’s layup opened up a 12-0 that took the two teams into the break with a 41-23 lead for West Georgia.
Offensively, it was tough to break through a strong Lane zone early, but the Braves’ team concept began to take hold and it was off to the races.
“We are a very unselfish basketball team, the kids are doing a good job sharing the ball tonight,” said coach Mike Cooney. “That’s why we were able to cut through their zone tonight.”
UWG shot 52 percent from the floor in the first half while holding Lane to just 29 percent.
In the second half, the Braves turned on the afterburners and left Lane behind, continuously building on the lead until the final horn sounded with UWG leading 91-65.
Petkunas was the individual leader for the Braves, hitting on 4-of-6 three-pointers en route to scoring a game-high 24 points. Chris Burras added 18, followed by Michael McCowan with 14 and Ramon Sims with 13.
As a team, the Braves shot a blistering 54% from the field on 36-of-67 shooting, including 8-of-17 from three-point range. West Georgia outrebounded the Dragons 44-31 and forced 22 turnovers on the night. The defense also had 13 takeaways in the game.
The Braves move to 2-0 on the year and face the Miles Golden Bears on Saturday night at 7 p.m.