It may have taken overtime to finish the job, but the Roanoke Catholic Celtics ultimately got the result they hoped for on Friday. They came out on top in a nail-biter against North Cross and snuck past 70-68. Having run the score up that high, both teams probably have some extra defensive drills coming up.
Roanoke Catholic found their leader in underclassman Demarcus Brown, who scored 27 points along with seven rebounds. Brown is on a roll when it comes to points, as he's now scored 17 or more in the last three games he's played. Marcus Pannell was another key contributor, scoring five points along with six assists and four steals.
North Cross lost despite a true team effort on the offense, the best among them being Antonio Mack, who scored 28 points. That was a full 41.2% of North Cross' points, marking the 14th time in a row he's earned more than a third of the team's points. The team also got some help courtesy of Jesiah Hines, who scored 23 points.
Even though they lost, North Cross smashed the offensive glass and finished the game with 16 offensive rebounds. They easily outclassed their opponents in that department as Roanoke Catholic only pulled down seven offensive rebounds.
Roanoke Catholic's win ended a three-game drought at home and bumped them up to 3-10. As for North Cross, their loss ended a three-game streak of away wins and brought them to 8-7.
Roanoke Catholic will be playing in front of their home fans against the Bobcats at 7:00 p.m. on Monday. The matchup should be an exciting one, as these teams are closely ranked in Virginia (Radford is ranked 261st, while the Celtics are ranked 254th). North Cross' road trip will continue as they head out to face the Dragons at 6:30 p.m. on January 23rd. One thing working in Stuart Hall's favor is that they have posted big point totals in their last three games.
