Feb 6, 2011 By Adam Brewer For The 3 min read

ROGERSVILLE – Mapletown used a pressure defense and a balanced scoring attack to defeat West Greene 42-26 in Section 3-A action Friday night.

The Maples (2-17, 2-6) sweep the season-series with its Greene County rival and still cling to their playoffs hopes, as they need to win their two remaining section games and have Jefferson-Morgan lose their last two games in section play.

Mapletown visits Jeff-Morgan on Monday for a pivotal match-up.

“We had better defense tonight,” Mapletown coach Bo Garnek said. “We usually average 40-some points a game, but I thought in the second half we really started to click offensively. We are more of a second-half team. We are still alive for the playoffs, and we are using that for motivation.”

It was a slow moving opening eight minutes, as the Maples held a 6-3 edge over the Pioneers (0-17, 0-8).

In the second stanza, Mapletown scored 11 straight points and jumped out to a 17-3 lead. West Greene closed the gap by ending the second period on a 6-2 spree and trailed 18-9 at halftime.

The Maples began the third period with a 10-2 run, but the Pioneers battled and remained in the game by scoring the last six points to trailed 28-17 at the end of three.

Mapletown put the game out of reach with 12 consecutive points to start the final eight minutes and raced to a 40-17 lead midway through the quarter and held on to win the road contest.

“We pressed a little more and were more aggressive than usual,” Garnek said. “Today, we got a lead early, and our defense controlled the tempo of the game. A lot of our freshmen led the pressure, and that is always good to see them do that and to know their assignments.”

Marcus Cumpston had six of his team-high 13 points in the fourth for the Maples, while William Cox chipped in with 10.

Mapletown’s underclassmen were big in the game, as freshmen Dana White added seven points in the paint and Derrick Riggleman contributed five.

“It’s very important to get our young guys involved in our offense,” Garnek said. “Everybody knows that we have two main scorers, but if those young guys can get their points, it takes the pressure off of everybody on the court. We would love to have that balance every game. Derrick handled the ball well and Dana was physical and aggressive tonight.”

West Greene’s coach Ed Kilgore said that he is still preaching consistency to his young team and that the effort has been there the last few games.

Jordan Rode paced the Pioneers’ scoring attack with 11 points.