There's no place like home for the Sanderson Spartans, who bounced back after a tough loss on the road last Saturday. They walked away with a 48-41 win over Wake Forest on Friday. Given Sanderson's advantage in MaxPreps' North Carolina basketball rankings (they are ranked 121st, while Wake Forest is ranked 518th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.
Nathan Fife was his usual excellent self, scoring 23 points along with five assists and three steals. That makes it four consecutive games in which he has scored at least a third of Sanderson's points. Another player making a difference was Patrick Dalton, who scored 13 points along with six rebounds and three steals.
Wake Forest lost despite a true team effort on the offense, the best among them being Caleb Lashley, who scored nine points along with three steals. The team also got some help courtesy of Braeden Markel, who scored six points along with six rebounds.
Wake Forest struggled to get the ball back on offense and finished the game with only two offensive rebounds. That's the fewest offensive rebounds they've managed all season.
Sanderson has been performing well recently as they've won four of their last five matches, which provided a massive bump to their 7-5 record this season. As for Wake Forest, their defeat was their sixth straight on the road dating back to last season, which bumped their record down to 1-12.
Both teams will have to hit the road in their upcoming games. Sanderson will challenge Knightdale at 5:15 p.m. on Monday. Knightdale is strutting with some offensive muscle, as they've averaged 62.2 points per game. As for Wake Forest, they will head out on the road to challenge Leesville Road at 6:30 p.m. on Friday. Leesville Road has insisted on making their lastthree contests complete nail-biters, turning in a record of 0-3 during that stretch of close contests.
