CONCORD —Salisbury High’s boys basketball team stands 2-1 today, mostly because Randall is too hot to handle.
Randall Jones, the Hornets’ 5-foot-9 senior guard, continued his spree of offensive magic Monday night at Rimer Gym, tossing in 27 points as coach Drew Mathews’ Hornets won a wild 81-68 nonconference scrap with Concord. In three games this season, Jones has scored 26, 28 and 27.
“My confidence is getting up,” said Jones, who has shown flashes of offensive genius ever since he first made the Hornet varsity. “It feels good to have games like this. And if teams worry about me, then someone else will have a good game.”
“Randall is our Larry Bird,” whooped Hornet forward Ken Drye, who was also spectacular with 22 points — many of them coming from crazy angles that Minnesota Fats would have shied away from.
At times it looked like Jones, Drye and Markeice Daugherty were playing an updated version of HORSE — complete with defenders and referees. Many times they left Concord’s veteran coach Foster Parker hoarse from screaming at his defenders to somehow stop them.
Jones scored 16 in the second half as the Hornets held off repeated second-half runs by the Spiders. But Jones kept Mathews on the edge of his seat when he picked up his fourth foul fighting for a rebound with 4:03 remaining in the third quarter and Salisbury’s crazily fluctuating lead down to single digits.
“I told Randall if he fouled out, I was going to break his darn neck,” said Mathews, who put him back on the floor for good with 6:45 to go.
Mathews looked like a man who might leap off a ledge when Jones reached in on a Spider dribbler at midcourt with four minutes left. Fortunately for Mathews, Jones got a huge steal and layup instead of a foul, pushing the Hornets’ lead back to a dozen.
At any rate, Mathews could scarcely have afforded to snap Jones in half. His team is already playing short-handed with starting point guard Boo Blount out for 10 days or so with a hyper-extended calf muscle and opening-night starting center Stephen Blanton no longer with the team.
Without Blount, whose ballhandling skills allow the Hornets to speed up or slow down at Mathews’ command, Salisbury was stuck in one gear — flat out. At times, the Hornets were a runaway truck flying through crowded downtown streets at 65 miles per hour. Luckily for the Hornets, Concord, playing its first game, was equally pell-mell.
“We were fortunate that they wanted to go up and down with us,” said Mathews. “We are short-handed. Kids are having to adjust and take on new roles. We played hard, but we also played out of control.”
Most of the work of filling in for Blount at the point fell to forward Daugherty, a spectacular athlete who made some turnovers, but also did things that most point guards can’t do. He had six rebounds in the first quarter and a team-high 11 for the game.
“We’re hurting without Boo,” said Drye. “But Markeice stepped up. He did a good job for us.”
The Hornets finished the first quarter on an 11-0 run for a 23-8 lead. Concord never caught up, but Salisbury was too inconsistent to ever put the Spiders away. The Hornets were dazzling for two minutes, then frazzling for two minutes.
The Hornets’ lead jumped to 15 in the third quarter after two Jones 3s, but then dipped back to seven when Alton Cook, who led the Spiders with 19 points, answered with a trio of 3-pointers.
With six minutes remaining, Concord closed to within 62-57 — its closest since the first quarter — on a pair of Greg Calzado free throws. But that was Jones’ cue to take over. He flipped in a shot over his shoulder. Then after a flying hoop by Drye, Jones pumped in back-to-back buckets to shove the lead back to a dozen.
The Hornets successfully managed to spread the floor over the last three minutes, with Drye doing most of the decision-making. They made enough free throws to hang on to their second straight win.
“We won because of our endurance,” said Drye, whose father used to play ball for the Spiders. “We might struggle at times, but one thing about us, we are definitely in shape.”
NOTES:Senior Taylor Knauf and soph Jerome Allison have stepped into the starting lineup for the Hornets and combined for 17 points and 11 rebounds. ... Hornet reserve guard Justin Leonard had a night that was memorable or forgettable depending on how you looked at it. He fouled out, while playing roughly five minutes. “I was the smallest guy out there,” sighed Leonard. “But every foul was on me.”
SALISBURY (81) — Jones 27, Drye 22, Daugherty 11, Allison 9, Knauf 8, Geter 2, Leonard 2, Miller, Means, Bost.
CONCORD (68) — Cook 19, Calzado 17, Peay 13, Tucker 7, Howard 5, Johnson 4, Cummings 3, Fairly, Smith.
Salisbury 23 16 20 22 — 81
Concord 9 18 24 18 — 69
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