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Allen at full strength heading back into district
BY Kevin Hageland Staff Writer
The good news for Allen is that the team broke its four-game losing streak on the final day of The Colony Tournament.
The bad news for the Eagles is that the win came only after losing the first two games in the aforementioned tournament.
“We certainly wanted to win at least two of our three games during the tournament,” said Jeff Higgins, Allen head coach. “But we had trouble scoring and didn’t shoot the ball particularly well.”
“Flower Mound was just a much better team than us on Thursday,” Higgins said.
Things went better for Allen in the second game of the day, but the Eagles still trailed Denton Ryan, 36-26, heading into the final quarter. But Allen, which was paced by 10 points from senior CJ Ogbuehi, made a feverish comeback in the final frame.
The Eagles even took the lead at one point before an ill-advised shot, ill-advised foul and what Higgins termed as, “two defensive breakdowns,” allowed Ryan to capture the 49-48 victory.
“We pressed well against Denton Ryan and I was happy with our defensive intensity all game,” Higgins said. “We forced 25 turnovers and had 17 offensive rebounds; usually we win with numbers like that.”
But another number haunted the Eagles as despite nine points from junior Alec Rothbauer and seven from senior Jeff Campbell, Allen shot just 27 percent from the field.
After having won seven straight games during late-November and early-December, the loss to the Raiders was Allen’s fourth in a row. That streak would only last until the next day though as the Eagles finished The Colony Tournament with a 66-53 victory over Irving MacArthur.
Junior LaCris Anyiam led Allen with 14 points, while Campbell and Rothbauer posted 12 and 10 points, respectively. Another player who contributed was senior Rocky Lewis, who dropped in five points one day after scoring six against Ryan.
“LaCris, Alec and Rocky all got some good minutes in this tournament and did some good things for us,” Higgins said. “And as a team, we moved the ball much better against Irving MacArthur.”
Higgins went on to say that those contributions were especially important as junior Jeremy Reeves was forced to miss the event due to illness. And though Allen lost two of three games over the weekend, Higgins saw positives coming out of the tournament.
“It helped us work some of the rust off,” he said. “And then Saturday, we had our best practice of the year. We worked 80 percent of the time on defense and it was very intense.”
That’s good news for Eagles’ fans as the team begins a stretch of three games in six days that will be vitally important. Allen hosts Wylie today at 7:30 p.m. and hits the road to play Plano West at 7:30 p.m. Saturday. Those three teams, along with Lake Highlands, are tied for third in District 9-5A with a 1-1 mark.
“For us, the playoffs are now,” Higgins said. “We really have 12 playoff games coming up because all of the remaining district games are weighted the same.
“These teams all know each other well, so even more so than usual it will be about the team who executes best.”
Reeves and Campbell, who played in The Colony Tournament despite not being 100 percent, are both expected to be ready for the game against the Pirates.
“Wylie is the biggest game of the year for us, because it is the next game,” Higgins said. “Plus this is the first day back at school for us, so we are hoping for a big crowd.”
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