Two dominant guards in Grayson Burleson and Ryan Benderman are getting ready to go toe-to-toe. The Summertown Eagles will head out on the road to square off against the Mt. Pleasant Tigers at 7:00 p.m. on Friday. Hopefully Summertown focused on turnovers this week since the team gave up 11 on Tuesday.
Summertown has been a dominant force so far, but they're in the middle of a mini-slump at the moment. They took a 66-54 hit to the loss column at the hands of Loretto.
Summertown's loss shouldn't obscure the performances of Kurt Burleson, who scored 19 points along with six rebounds and five blocks, and Burleson who scored 16 points along with five rebounds and two steals. That was a full 35.2% of Summertown's points, marking the third time in a row he's earned more than a third of the team's points. Lleyton Sherman was another key contributor, scoring three points along with three steals.
Meanwhile, Mt. Pleasant waltzed into their match on Tuesday with three straight wins but they left with four. They took down Lewis County 78-63. Given Mt. Pleasant's advantage in MaxPreps' Tennessee basketball rankings (they are ranked 168th, while the Panthers are ranked 365th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.
Mt. Pleasant's win was the result of several impressive offensive performances. One of the most notable came from Hayden Holt, who scored 26 points along with two steals. Holt is on a roll when it comes to points, as he's now scored 15 or more in the last four games he's played. Another player making a difference was Benderman, who dropped a double-double on 21 points and 14 rebounds.
Summertown has been struggling recently as they've lost four of their last five games, which put a noticeable dent in their 17-7 record this season. As for Mt. Pleasant, they pushed their record up to 16-5 with that victory, which was their third straight on the road.
Some high-performance offense is likely on the agenda as both teams are some of the highest scoring teams in the league. Summertown hasn't had any problem running up the score this season, having averaged 71.2 points per game. However, it's not like Mt. Pleasant struggles in that department as they've been averaging 62.7 points per game. With both teams so easily able to put up points, the only question left is who can run the score up higher.
Summertown couldn't quite finish off the Tigers when the teams last played back in February of 2023 and fell 75-73. Can Summertown avenge their loss or is history doomed to repeat itself? We'll find out soon enough.
