Wilmore and Murrell lead Whitehaven past Lausanne, 67-51
Junior forward Jordan Wilmore started the game off with a dunk. Junior shooting guard Matthew Murrell scored on Whitehaven’s second offensive possession of the first quarter. And Murrell and Wilmore kept scoring after that, helping the Tigers defeat Lausanne, 67-51,…
Access all of Prep Hoops
Continue reading this article and more.
Continue ReadingJunior forward Jordan Wilmore started the game off with a dunk.
Junior shooting guard Matthew Murrell scored on Whitehaven’s second offensive possession of the first quarter.
And Murrell and Wilmore kept scoring after that, helping the Tigers defeat Lausanne, 67-51, Thursday night. Whitehaven (6-1) has won two straight since losing to Wooddale last month. Murrell led the Tigers with 27 points. Wilmore, the 7-foot-4 post player, added 15.
Whitehaven built a double-digit lead three times (twice in the second quarter) during the game, but the Lynx (4-2) cut their deficit down to single on the first two go-arounds. Heading into the fourth quarter, the Tigers held a 46-38 lead after Sky Forest and Jalen Montgomery rallied Lausanne from a 42-29 hole.
But, Murrell got going to start the final quarter, draining three-consecutive shots from 3-point range to build a 55-38 lead. The Lynx wouldn’t threaten again, and Murrell knocked down one more 3 to make sure Lausanne wouldn’t get back into the game.
Murrell is a 6-3 shooting guard, but his coach, Faragi Phillips feels he will move away from that position once he gets to college.
“Right now, he’s developing in practice, not in games, but in practice on ball handling under pressure, because, obviously, on the next level, I feel he’s going to be a point guard,” Phillips said about Murrell, who made four of his team’s 11 3s. “So, we work on that every day.
“At this point, me being his coach and having a pulse on this team, most specifically him, he’s not really comfortable right now with that, so we kind of hide it from everybody else.”
Senior combo guard Sky Forest led the Lynx with 17 points. Forest is gradually finding his rhythm on the basketball court after leading the Lausanne football team to an 11-1 record. Montgomery added 12.
Cameron Sims, another football player and a Central Arkansas commit, struggled on the offensive end after scoring 19 Tuesday night at Memphis Central. He finished with eight points. Sophomore combo guard Alden Applewhite had nice looks at the basket, but couldn’t get his shots to fall.
He finished with six points.
3 takeaways
Lausanne had wide open looks from 3-point range, but the shots weren’t falling.
The Lynx’s defense had lapses at times, which allowed Whitehaven to get nice looks from 3.
Wilmore is starting to come along for the Tigers. He was active on both ends of the court. He scored 11 of his 15 points in the first half. He has come a long way since he arrived at Whitehaven at the start of the school year. Coach Phillips is happy with where Wilmore is.
“On a team with this much talent, the one thing that can destroy greatness is jealousy, because guess what? The spotlight isn’t on me tonight,” Phillips said. “And that’s what these young people don’t understand, and I’m trying to show them through this guide that it may not be you tonight.
“It may very well be Matthew. It may very well be Jordan. At the same time, if it’s that, and Jordan plays well, let’s go through that, let’s work that. It may not be your night. So, those are the things we saw today. But, it wasn’t something that happened over night. It builds overtime.”