The West McDowell Spartans basketball team still has its eye on a share of the Foothills Conference Championship after beating county rival East McDowell 60-41 Monday afternoon.
Monday’s win improves the Spartans to 8-3 in league. That, combined with Table Rock’s 52-49 loss to Liberty, has created a tie for second place in the loss column. A win by West McDowell in Thursday’s finale against East Burke (9-2) could result in a three-way tie for the league title.
After a slow first quarter by both teams, West began to grow a working margin, leading 25-14 at the half.
East McDowell (1-10) kept itself in the game during the second half thanks to some hot shooting from guard Kennedy Kincaid (17 points, 2 rebounds). The Trojans cut the margin to as low as 33-26 after two free throws from Juwann Blanton (13 points, 9 rebounds, 6 assists) midway through the third.
However the Spartans answered the run with eight points in a row to push the lead back into double figures.
West was able to make use of that margin, not allowing it to go any lower than nine points the rest of the way. Blanton trimmed the lead to 49-40 at the 3:11 mark on two more free throws.
Ethan McMahan tallied 11 points to lead the Spartans’ balanced attack. Brady Smith and Kevin Rivas (5 assists, 4 rebounds) netted eight points each.
Tanner Dillingham (9 rebounds), Chris Clayton, Divese Carson, Dylan Grindstaff (7 rebounds, 2 assists) and Michael Wall (4 rebounds) had six points apiece and Gavin Shepherd scored three points.
Luke Causby scored five points for East McDowell. Michael Evans and Cole Fender added two points each. Ethan Wyatt and Chase Justice scored one point.
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