High School Basketball: Century Girls Open Hoop Season With Win

Cassidy Jones and Jamie Clark hit free throws in the final 25 seconds to lead Century to a 51-49 victory over the defending Class 3A champion Frederick Cadets Monday evening.

"We played tough. I thought some our foul shots down toward the end were really crucial, Jamie Clark and Cassidy," said Century coach Joel Beard.

 In other girls action Monday evening South Carroll downed Linganore 55-39 and Oakdale defeated Liberty 54-44. In boys basketball, Century opened the season with a 71-41 win over Walkersville.

Clark toed the foul line for two shots with 25 seconds remaining and the Cadets up 48-47. She hit both and 15 seconds later Jones went to the line for two more foul shoots. She sunk both to give the home Knights a 51-48 lead.

Frederick went to the foul line and made one shot with eight seconds remaining on the clock. They had a few shots for the tying bucket, but didn’t connect.

The Knights had nine players score in the opening game of the season. They were led by Alice Mercer and Haley Bordner with 11 points each. Clark had eight points followed by Brooke Snyder with seven, Angela Flister and Jones with four each, Victoria Perrone tossed in three, Tess Nichols, two and Alyssa Dixon, one.

Frederick was led by Lauren Tolson with 30 points.

The biggest lead either team had was seven points in the second quarter, when Century was up 24-17. Frederick came back to tie the contest at 24 with a minute left in the first half. Flister sunk the front end of a one-an-one with 10 seconds left to give Century a 25-24 lead at the half.

"It was a good game. It was a tough game for either team to lose. They are expectably talented. Tolson is one heck of a player and our kids battled all night and hung in there. It’s the first game. Nice ball game. Overall, just pleased. I was hoping we could compete and I thought we did that all night," said Beard.

Frederick won the junior varsity game 43-30. Sky Hyatt led Century with 11 points.

Coach Joel Beard is familiar with the team as the Knights returned all but two players this year. They were 6-8 in the county last year.

"Century hopes to improve on our 11-12 record from last year.  We start with two difficult games, Frederick and Thomas Johnson," said Beard.

Top returnees are Alice Mercer, 9 points per game; Jamie Clark, 7.0 ppg and Haley Bordner 6.5 ppg.

Other potential starters will come from among Angela Flister, Cassidy Jones, Tess Nichols, Brooke Snyder, Victoria Perrone, Alyssa Dixon, Allyson Belknap, Mackenzie Patten and Alyssia Harris.

Clark, Bordner and Flister led the squad in rebounding last year.

Asked who was the team to beat in the county Beard said, ``In order to be successful, Century will have to be more consistent on offense and develop scoring threats.  I think that the Carroll County looks to be very even.  South Carroll, Liberty, Westminster and Winters Mill are favorites.  Any team from top to bottom could beat any other on a given evening.’’

Beard is starting his 11th year of guiding the Knights. Century opened the season hosting Frederick Monday.

The Lions were 18-5 overall and 12-2 in the county last year. Liberty opens their third season under coach Jessica Morgan on Monday.

Liberty returns five players from last year with Kelly McCormick (14.9) and  Hailey Marlatt (12.8) as the top returning scorers. Marlatt is also the top returning rebounded.

The projected starters are Marlatt, McCormick, Kaelyn Storr, Christine Johnson and Taylor Sprague.

When asked who is the team to beat in the county, Morgan says,"South Carroll is usually good."

"Great group of athletes. Hard workers who are willing to work together this year to go far. I've had a lot of fun working with them so far this year and there seems to be a great team chemistry. So combine that with the experience we have and our height and quickness and we should have a good team," Morgan says about this years team.

The Cavaliers are the defending county champions and suffered their first loss of the season before the first game. They lost forward Katie Mathias for the season with a knee injury.

Coach Liz Padgett is starting her seventh year. Last season, South Carroll was 18-5 overall and 13-1 in the county.

Returning for the Cavaliers are seniors Nikki Heim and Maggie Payne and junior Makeba Ndifang.

Heim averaged 12, 8 points a game last year in 14 games as a knee injury shortened her season.

The Cavaliers opened the season Monday hosting Linganore.