Andrews – First-year head coach Matt Maennle knew his team would have a tough time with the Panthers on Friday night. Franklin is a 3A school, and had a size and athleticism advantage over Andrews.
That made the difference in the final score, a 75-58 win for the Panthers. However, Maennle was proud of his team’s effort, as Franklin was always in control but never broke open the game.
“Other than a couple little things, they played great,” Maennle said. “They really did. The score is worse than what it was. That’s what we talked about in the locker room, we played well.”
Isaac Weaver led the Wildcats (1-1 overall) in scoring with a team-high 22 points, despite not scoring in the opening frame. Weaver was missing his usual backcourt mate in Donovan Bateman, who was out with an injury, but freshman Kegan Ellis stepped up in a big way.
The 5’5 guard scored 16 points, and wasn’t afraid to push the ball down court or challenge bigger defenders. Fellow freshman Ty Clark also got big minutes, especially in the second half when Cameron Rattler was on the bench with foul trouble.
“We talked about that in the locker room,” Maennle said. “We don’t know who the five best are going to be every single night. Some guys had a tough night. For freshmen to step up like that, it says a lot.”
The Panthers (3-0) jumped out to a 10-0 lead and were never seriously threatened, though it never felt like a blowout. The closest Andrews would get was seven, but Franklin’s biggest lead all night was 20 points. Senior Miles McClure was too much to handle for Andrews, scoring a game-high 33 points. Parker Cabe was the only other Panther in double figures, chipping in 12 points.
The Wildcats called timeout after Franklin jumped out to a 12-2 lead, and cut the deficit to seven before trailing 20-9 at the end of the first quarter. Every time it looked like Andrews was going to put a scare in Franklin, the Panthers had an answer.
Three-pointers by Weaver and Ellis early in the second quarter cut the Franklin lead to 22-14, leading to a Panthers timeout. McClure answered back with his second of his four triples in the game to push the lead back out to 11. Another 5-point burst by Weaver and Ellis trimmed the lead to eight again late in the quarter, but a layup by McClure extended the lead back to 10 at 36-26 heading into halftime.
The Panthers went on a 12-2 run to open the third quarter to take a 48-28 lead. Andrews would never get it closer than 11 after that.
“It’s going to help us a lot when we get into conference play,” Maennle said of playing Franklin. “They’re good. They’re probably going to make a deep run in the playoffs.”
The Wildcats had two games this week, one at Tellico Plains, Tenn., on Monday night, then Tuesday at Hiwassee Dam. Results of those games were not available until after this week’s edition of the Cherokee Scout went to press.