Lexington boys pull away

Fri. January 27, 2012 at 11:00 p.m. | By Jason Queen

East Davidson's Max Suits dribbles past Lexington's Raekwon Byrd during their game Friday night. (Photo by Donnie Roberts/The Dispatch)

All the way up to the head coach, East Davidson’s boys looked like the walking wounded Friday night.

Lexington wasn’t in the mood for any sympathy.

The Jackets got a combined 43 points from C.J. Woodberry and Keith Horton and secured a very business-like 71-49 win over the Eagles. Lexington rolled to 6-0 in the CCC, 9-8 overall, while East dipped to 1-5, 5-13.

As good as East’s Taylor Booze (24 points) was in the paint, Woodberry nearly matched him bucket-for-bucket and rebound-for-rebound. He scored 22 points, with seven of his eight field goals coming from point blank range.

“That’s something I’ve been talking to C.J. about, I think he has to assert himself more for us to take the next step up,” Lexington coach Robert Hairston said. “That doesn’t mean he has to score 20 or 30 points every night.

“He’s just got to play a little harder, with a little more intensity.”

The Eagles tried to slow things down in the first quarter after Lexington won the first meeting by 40 points. It worked early, and the Jackets only led 12-6 after one quarter.

The Jackets picked up the pace in the second quarter, with Woodberry’s dunk off a loose ball and two nice runners by Horton staking the Jackets to a 31-23 advantage. While East hung around for a while, Eagles coach Matt Jacobs was hoping to keep things moving at a snail’s pace.

“They started pulling a little bit ahead, not big-time, but gaining a little bit of space, and that caused us to take a few bad shots,” Jacobs said. “But the biggest thing was the turnovers.

“When we were taking care of the ball, we were getting shots we wanted and we were right there with them.”

Booze got loose inside and scored on a nice feed from Josh Craven to get East within 31-25 on the first possession of the second half, but then the Jackets took over. Woodberry tipped in his own miss, Horton dropped another floater and that started a 20-2 explosion that put it out of reach.

Horton finished with 21 points for Lexington, which visits Thomasville Prep on Saturday before hosting West Davidson on Tuesday. East Davidson travels to Thomasville on Tuesday.