The College of Coastal Georgia Men's basketball team started their regular season home schedule off in a big way
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Brunswick, Ga. – The College of Coastal Georgia Men's basketball team started their regular season home schedule off in a big way on Monday, defeating the visiting Brewton-Parker JV 131-68 in the Coffin Gymnasium.
Freshman guard Jaren Harris ( Tennille, Ga. / Washington Co.) found his shooting stroke as he netted a career-high 22 points and freshman forward Kevin Bradshaw (Rembert, SC/ Crestwood ) also contributed 22 points.
“I think we found our identity tonight,” Harris said of the Mariners, who improved to 2-3 on the season with Monday's win over the Barons. “We'd lost our chemistry and we needed to get that back as a team.”
According to Harris, the Mariners are at their best when every player on the court contributes. That was the case in Monday's game in which seven players finished with double figures in points.
Freshmen forwards Kentorey Johnson ( Sandersville, Ga./ Washington Co. ), Eric Martin ( Lilly, Ga./ Dooly Co. ), Tray Pearce ( Ashburn, Ga./ Turner Co. ), dropped 17, 16 and 13 points respectively, while sophomore guards Antonio Tribble ( Newberry, SC/ Newberry ) and Paul Finn ( Richmond, Va. / Meadowbrook ) added 14 and 10 points apiece.
“Spreading the wealth and getting everyone involved is a lot easier than relying on one or two guys to get you through the game,” Harris said.
Mariners' head coach Gerald Cox said he was happy to see his team shoot better from the floor and improve in other areas in the home-opener.
“We've got to get better at everything, “Cox said. “But, we got a couple of guys out of shooting slumps, specifically Jaren Harris, so it was good to see us shoot like we're supposed to.”
Though the Mariners handled the over-matched Brewton-Parker Junior Varsity team, Cox was still impressed with his teams in several facets of the game. Cox said the team showed a better effort cutting on offense and improved its post play and perimeter defense.
“I told the team they have four or five different things to improve on if they're going to take this team to the next level and be as good as I think they can be,” Cox said. “They were trying to do that here tonight.”
Cox said the Mariners will have to keep improving if they hope to win out this week.
On Wednesday, the Mariners travel to Walterboro, SC to face the perennially tough USC-Salkehatchie before hosting Central Florida Community College, the No. 1-ranked Division I Junior College team in the country, on Saturday Nov. 14 at 7:30 p.m. in the Coffin Gym.
General admission for home games is $5, while faculty, staff, students and children 12 years old and under will be admitted for free.