Garden City drops sixth straight

By Mike Pilosof

Photo by Adam Shrimplin

Garden City, KS-Seward County was without two key players on Wednesday night: Branton McCrary and Greg Johnson. But the eight guys that did suit up more than held their own. And in the process, the Saints handed Garden City their sixth straight loss.

Kyle Cardaci scored 21 points in 37 minutes, Roy Clarke tallied 16 off the bench, and Seward County pushed past the Broncbusters 85-73 at Conestoga Arena. It was Garden City's 13^th loss in their last 14 games.

"I think their soft press threw us off our game tonight," Broncbusters' Head Coach Patrick Nee said. "It's hard for our guys to get through that and setup our offense."

Garden City shot just 39 percent and hit only six 3's; this after drilling 13 in Saturday's loss to Barton. The Saints also, for the most part, bottled up Tahlik Chavez, limiting the sharp shooter to just 11 shot attempts.

"They closed out really well," Nee said.

Garden City never led in the game and was down by six early once Cardaci nailed a 3 from the corner. After the Broncbusters got back to within one on Kaleb Favors' long ball, the Saints blitzed the Broncbusters with a 10-0 run, which included Griffin Brosowske's triple that gave Seward a 21-11 advantage with 11:28 to go in the first half.

"There were so many times when guys are going off doing their own thing," Nee said.

Steven Samuels though provided the second-year coach with a punch off the bench, throwing down a two-handed dunk; then taking Traylynn Spencer's baseball pass and finishing at the rim with an acrobatic layup to pull Garden City to within two. But that's as close as they got the rest of the way. Browsowske hit another 3, Clark buried a triple, Cardaci rattled home a tough runner, and Rostyslav Novitskyi beat Steven Samuels on a spin from the left wing for 2, putting the Saints up 44-30 at the half. They closed the period on a 10-2 run, limiting Garden City to just two field goals over the final six minutes.

"This was the kind of game where we needed to beat guys off the dribble and create a shot for somebody else," Nee said. "We just didn't do that."

The Saints continued to apply pressure in the second half. Clarke connected from deep, Surakata Jawara sprinkled in a three-point play, and Seward was up by 19, 62-43.

"Seward did a good job of going one-on-one and creating opportunities where we overhelped," Nee explained. "We just cannot contain the ball. That's a major problem."

Despite their struggles offensively, Garden City pulled to within nine twice in the final 7:30. And when Chavez banked home an and-1 layup, the Broncbusters were down 73-64 with 3:44 remaining. But the freshman missed the ensuing free throw, Stephen Takyi flipped in a right-hand scoop, and Cardaci hit a momentum-deflating, fallaway 15-foot jumper at the shot-clock horn to put Seward up 77-64 with 2:22 remaining.

"Right now, our biggest problem is just guarding the ball," Nee said. "We end up having to play junk defenses, and it's not helping."

Novitskyi finished with 13 points in 30 minutes before fouling out late in the second half for Seward, who bounced back from a heartbreaking one-point loss to Hutchinson at home on Saturday.

Chavez scored 19 points in 36 minutes for Garden City, who is on pace for their fewest wins in nearly seven years. Spencer added 11 points but was held scoreless in the second half.

Next up: Garden City at Hutchinson-Saturday, Feb. 8-4 p.m. tip on 99.9 FM; westernkansasnews.com/kwkr and KWKR mobile app