Preview: Pine Forest Eagles vs. Rutherford Rams
Pine Forest has enjoyed the comforts of home their last two games, but now they'll head out on the road. They will take on the Rutherford Rams in a holiday battle at 12:30 p.m. on Tuesday at. The two teams are strolling into their games after big wins in their previous games.
Last Friday, everything went Pine Forest's way against West Florida as Pine Forest made off with a 56-36 victory. Given Pine Forest's advantage in MaxPreps' Florida basketball rankings (they are ranked 87th, while West Florida is ranked 280th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.
Pine Forest had a senior duo take command as Niylia Wilkins scored 24 points along with eight rebounds and three steals and Aniya Jackson scored 24 points along with six rebounds and five steals. The contest was Jackson's fifth in a row with at least ten points. The team also got some help courtesy of Cha'Miya Bivins-Goldsmith, who scored two points along with eight rebounds.
Meanwhile, Rutherford had already won six in a row (a stretch where they outscored their opponents by an average of 41.7 points), and they went ahead and made it seven on Monday. They put the hurt on New Site with a sharp 64-44 win. Considering Rutherford has won seven contests by more than 19 points this season, Monday's blowout was nothing new.
Pine Forest's win was their third straight at home, which pushed their record up to 6-2. Those victories were due in large part to their offensive dominance across that stretch, as they averaged 50.3 points per game. As for Rutherford, their victory bumped their record up to 9-1.
