The Pine Bluff High School Zebras pulled off a 47-38 win against the Fort Bend (Texas) Elkins Knights on Tuesday at the King Cotton Holiday Classic.
“It was an ugly win, but that’s better than a pretty loss,” Pine Bluff Coach Billy Dixon said. “We’ve got some things to work on. We didn’t respond with rebounds and we stood when we should have been going after the ball. We usually have a bad Monday, so I told the guys that this was our bad Monday.”
The hometown Zebras (8-5) were originally scheduled to play St. John Bosco from Bellflower, Calif., but Bosco faced travel complications and pulled out of the tournament Monday.
With a re-arrangement of the brackets, the Zebras faced the Knights (11-4) of Missouri City, Texas, in the tournament’s marquee game.
The Zebras’ Jordan Harris led the Zebras with 15 points. Courtney Crutchfield had 12 and Austyn Dendy scored nine points — four coming on slam dunks.
It only took a minute for the Zebras to get their footing against the Knights with Harris making a layup. That started an 8-2 Zebra run in the first quarter. The Zebras held the Knights, ending the first quarter 13-4.
In the second quarter, the Zebras were on fire with Crutchfield, whom the University of Arkansas Razorbacks are eyeing, scoring the first two points followed by Harris, who recently signed with the University of Missouri Tigers to play football.
The Zebras led 25-9 following two more dunks by Dendy and one by Crutchfield.
A Knights foul put Jabbar Spellman at the line for two. He missed the first, but got the second. The Zebras led 26-11 going into the half.
Neither team came out of the locker room on fire.
In the third quarter, the Zebras defense held the Knights to just seven points, three coming from the free throw line and four off layups in the third quarter. The Zebras scored only eight points in the third quarter and ended it leading 34-18.
The fourth quarter was a different story. The Knights made a strong comeback with six 3-pointers to shrink the Zebras’ lead, started by Jerren Hardeman.
The Zebras led 45-38 with 2 minutes left. A final layup by Crutchfield closed the deal for the Zebras,.
“We played hard but we got lazy at the end,” Dendy said. “We’ll work on that [today], but we are ready to play.”
Austyn Dendy of Pine Bluff splits two Fort Bend (Texas) Elkins defenders for a short-range shot in the third quarter Tuesday at the King Cotton Holiday Classic. (Pine Bluff Commercial/I.C. Murrell)