Basketball Game Preview: West Laurens Raiders vs. Harlem Bulldogs

The West Laurens Raiders will venture away from home to take on the Harlem Bulldogs at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday. Expect the scorekeeper to be kept busy: if their previous games are any indication, these teams will really light up the scoreboard.

West Laurens fought the good fight in their overtime contest against Hephzibah on Tuesday but wound up with a less-than-desirable result. They took a 74-66 hit to the loss column at the hands of the Rebels. While losing is never fun, the Raiders can't take it too hard given the team's big disadvantage in MaxPreps' Georgia basketball rankings (they are ranked 401st, while the Rebels are ranked 110th).

Meanwhile, Harlem had already won two in a row (a stretch where they outscored their opponents by an average of 27.5 points) and they went ahead and made it three on Tuesday. They claimed a resounding 72-21 victory over the Fightin' Irish. The Bulldogs have made a habit of sweeping their opponents off the court, having now won four matchups by 22 points or more this season.

West Laurens better focus on containing Ty Shine and AJ Williams as the pair were huge in Harlem's win. Shine went 8-for-12 on his way to 20 points and seven rebounds, while Williams shot 58% from the field to rack up 15 points in addition to eight steals and seven assists. Thanks to that strong game, Shine now owns an excellent 46.4% field goal percentage. The team also got some help courtesy of Justin Beckham, who posted five points.

Harlem was working as a unit and finished the game with 24 assists. The team's really been improving in that area: they've now improved their assist total in three consecutive games.

Harlem now has a winning record of 5-4. As for West Laurens, their loss dropped their record down to 2-6.

West Laurens came up short against Harlem in their previous matchup back in February, falling 58-49. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Williams, who shot 40% from the field en route to 24 points and three steals. Now that the Raiders know the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? There's only one way to find out.