Scott County Central boys basketball team dominates from start in semifinal win

DELTA, Mo. -- The Scott County Central Braves' march to a third consecutive state title got off to a good start Tuesday night -- even by their standards.

The top-seed and top-ranked Braves defeated No. 4 seed Richland 102-32 in the semifinal round of the Class 1 District 2 tournament at Delta.

SCC led 39-0 after one quarter and 71-8 at halftime.

The Braves' first five baskets were scored by four different players with only superstar Otto Porter failing to get a field goal in the very early going.

"It's just something the kids like to do to find the open guy," SCC coach Kenyon Wright said about his players spreading around the scoring to start the game. "I thought they passed the ball well, moved the ball well on transition and got everybody involved in the game by doing that."

Porter got involved soon enough and finished with a game-high 30 points with Georgetown coach John Thompson III watching in the Delta High School gym.

"That's something we take pride in," Porter said. "We just try to start out every game really strong.

"I mean, we've got to get a feel for it. It was our first game of districts. We've got to find our rhythm and go from there."

SCC shot 33 of 53 (62 percent) from the field in the first half. While the Braves made plenty of layups and Porter added a couple dunks, they also drained jumper after jumper from all over the field as they continued to spread around the ball.

"It's just something that just so happened," SCC senior Stewart Johnson said. "We just tried to come out and come out strong. Coach talked to us a lot about coming out aggressive, so we just wanted to come out aggressive. It just so happened we passed it around more than what we thought we would."

The Braves also dominated on defense, forcing 20 turnovers in the first quarter and holding Richland standout Ryan Kleffer scoreless in the first half.

Johnson, who was tasked with tracking Kleffer for most of the first half before yielding to the bench for most of the final two quarters, said the two were good friends and had played together in the past.

"I did my job," Johnson said with a laugh.

Kleffer scored 18 points in the second half to lead Richland.

Five SCC players finished in double digits. Lawrence Woodson and Dominique Porter had 15 points apiece.

Johnson, who finished with 10 points, said the team had talked about the importance of starting postseason play well.

"We're really big on that," Johnson said. "We try to get more serious, get more focused this time of season. What happened before, happened before. We're trying to get back to the state tournament, so we try to get serious at this time of the year.

Porter also chose the word serious to describe the team's attitude to start district play.

"It's serious now," he said. "We're all seniors and we just want to give it our all."

Richland 0 8 15 9 -- 32

SCC 39 32 19 12 -- 102

RICHLAND (32) -- Parker Evans 2, Jacob Hyten 5, Aaron Gilbert 1, Ryan Kleffer 18, Nicholas Daniels 2, Richard Forshee 4. FG 13, FT 4-15, F 6. (3-pointers: Kleffer 1. Fouled out: none)

SCOTT COUNTY CENTRAL (102) -- Blake Pobst 5, Stewart Johnson 10, Trey Johnson 10, Lawrence Woodson 15, Otto Porter 30, Dominique Porter 15, Bryan Freed 4, Antonio Johnson 3, Calvin Porter 5, Ben Freed 5. FG 46, FT 6-11, F 12. (3-pointers: Pobst 1, S. Johnson 1, Br. Freed 1, A. Johnson 1. Fouled out: none)