D6 EZ M2 THE WASHINGTON POST.SATURDAy, NOVEMbER 9 , 2019
ards failed to consistently com-
pete.
With 9:39 remaining in the
fourth quarter, the Wizards had
cut their margin to just one, but
the momentum stalled with a
two-minute scoreless drought
that featured a familiar combina-
tion of missed shots, bad fouls
and costly turnovers. In the
fourth quarter, Washington con-
nected on only 8 of 21 attempts
and scored 16 points.
As the Cavaliers dribbled out
the closing seconds of their win at
Capital one Arena, showing a bit
of sportsmanship by taking a
turnover instead of launching an
unnecessary shot, several Wiz-
ards players stood watching,
hands on their hips.
Cleveland (3-5) actually has a
less experienced roster than
Washington — the Cavaliers’ av-
erage number of NBA years is
4.00, while the Wizards, skewed
by players such as 15-year veteran
CJ miles, are at 4.67 years. Still,
hands on their hips, the Wizards
showed a posture of defeat by the
end. Another loss hit the books,
and Beal blamed the one trait that
has defined the Wizards’ season.
“We didn’t defend,” he said.
“That’s what happened.”
[email protected]BY MICHAEL ERRIGOAfter the band had cleared and
before either team had returned
from the locker room, there were
just two players on the turf at
Stone Bridge. Broad run quarter-
back mitch Griffis, coming off a
taxing first half, threw the football
back and forth with his brother
Brett, his backup.
The first half of Loudoun C oun-
ty’s “Battle of the ’Burn” rivalry
was electric, and the Griffis broth-
ers were enjoying a quiet moment
before the storm of the second
half.
With a f ull complement o f Spar-
tans surrounding him, the senior
quarterback sparkled in the sec-
ond half, leading No. 10 Broad
run to a 35-21 victory in the
18th edition of this clash between
Ashburn powers. He f inished with
367 passing yards, three touch-
downs through the air and two on
the ground in his final game
against the Bulldogs.
“I saw heart from him. Passion.
That’s all you can ask for from
your quarterback,” s enior wide re-
ceiver romy miner said. “We’ve
been playing together since
eighth grade, and he shows noth-
ing but that. Nothing but charac-
ter. I love that man.”
In y ears past, t he g ame has b een
played with major Class 5 playoff
implications attached. But after
the Spartans (10-0) moved down
to Class 4 this fall, the rivalry now
comes with o nly b ragging rights.
“You saw, this means a lot to
them,” Coach matt Griffis said.
“We had a lot of kids injured com-
ing into this game, and they came
to me and said, ‘ Hey, I ’m n ot going
to miss this.’ You saw, they were
warriors.”
While Stone Bridge (9-1) has
won 14 of the 18 meetings in the
series, the rivalry has grown more
competitive in recent seasons.
This is the second time in the past
three years the two programs have
entered this game, played in the
last week of the regular season,undefeated.
on friday night the Spartans
looked more than ready for the
postseason as the defense repeat-
edly stifled Stone Bridge’s signa-
ture s ingle-wing. By the end of the
night, the S partans had f orced f ive
turnovers and o utscored the h igh-
powered Bulldogs 22-7 in the sec-
ond half.
mitch Griffis has been banged
up recently and missed l ast week’s
game against Briar Woods. But he
seemed invincible for most of fri-
day, eluding pressure and consis-
tently extending drives.
With t hree minutes left a nd the
Spartans needing a touchdown to
seal the victory, a quarterback
draw left Griffis on the turf for a
long time. Slowly, he came to the
sideline.
He sat out one play, then re-
turned for a fifth and final score,
punching it in himself from two
yards out. Afterward, h e collapsed
on the bench and put his head in
his hands.
“I’m hurt everywhere,” he said
following the victory.
[email protected]VIrgInIA nonleAgUe footbAll
Broad Run takes ‘Battle of the ’Burn’
BrOAD ruN 35,
stONE BrIDGE 21BY KYLE MELNICKWhen Northern failed to reach
the end zone in the final seconds
friday and S t. Charles held o n for a
24-21 win in Waldorf, the home
school’s p ublic address announcer
said something these Spartans
football players have dreamed
about for years: “Your Spartans
will advance to the second round
of the state playoffs.”
St. C harles came close t o its f irst
playoff win last season — losing to
Northern by a point in overtime.
But on friday, the sixth-year pro-
gram claimed its first postseason
victory in the first round of the
maryland 3A South playoffs.
St. Charles plays Huntingtown,
the Southern maryland Athletic
Conference’s t op team t his y ear, i n
the s econd round next w eek. Hun-
tingtown won the regular season
meeting, 21-20, o n oct. 4.
“It’s like a dream come t rue,” St.
Charles wide receiver Konner
Blount-foster said. “This is what
we wanted to do. This is like a
revenge game.”
St. Charles (8-2) and Northern
(5-5) h ave experienced similar t ra-
jectories to become SmAC con-
tenders. St. Charles was a mid-
dling squad until Patrick orndoff,
a longtime North Point assistant
coach, became the Spartans’ coach
last year. In o rndoff ’s f irst year, St.
Charles earned its first winning
record.
When Steve Crounse took over
Northern in 2 017, the Patriots
hadn’t finished with a winning
record since 2010. With Crounse,
Northern reached the state quar-
terfinals the past two years.
When St. C harles and Northern
meet, they’re fighting to join the
upper echelon of their league. And
their games often come down to
the f inal play.
In the first round of last year’s
maryland 3A playoffs, Northern
connected on a fourth-and-goal
pass in overtime b efore finishing a
two-point conversion for a one-
point win. In September, North-
ern trailed St. Charles by five
points when it took the ball to theSpartans’ 3-yard line with just
over a minute remaining. St.
Charles kept its foe out of the end
zone.
friday was a nother t ight o ne.
Leading by three points, St.
Charles drained the clock until it
punted the ball to Northern with
18 seconds remaining.
“Get b ack. Don’t l et t hem s core,”
St. C harles defensive back Klayton
Batten thought. “make a play —
anything. Just s top them from get-
ting to the e nd z one.”
The Spartans did; Northern
hardly advanced the b all.
When orndoff took over St.
Charles’s program in spring 2018,
he implemented the wing-T of-
fense, w hich f it h is p layers’ a thleti-
cism. That helped the program
earn its first playoff appearance
last season, and the team contin-
ued to improve this season. It
claimed a signature win last
month against North Point, a pe-
rennial top SmAC t eam.
“We didn’t know we were going
to have the success we had right
away,” o rndoff said. “But it d oesn’t
shock u s.”
[email protected]mArylAnD 3A SoUtH footbAll PlAyoffS
Spartans pick up first postseason win
st. CHArLEs 24,
NOrtHErN 21BY RYAN MCFADDENSt. John’s senior Nicole Ta ylor
wasn’t pleased during the middle
of the volleyball season when she
had to watch her teammates com-
pete while she sat on the bench,
recovering from a concussion.
friday was a bit more joyous for
the now-healthy captain after the
Cadets swept Wilson, 25-16, 25-12,
25-11, to capture their seventh
straight D .C. State Athletic Associ-
ation championship at Trinity
University.
“Going out with a bang feels
amazing,” Taylor said. “for this
being m y final year, my t eam made
me the happiest captain, and I’m
happy they helped me get to this
point in my career.”
Throughout the season,
St. John’s (28-4) had to deal with
injuries and illnesses, forcing it to
play shorthanded. But the Cadets,
who also won the Washington
Catholic Athletic Conference title
Sunday, were still able to accom-
plish the goals they set at the
beginning o f the season.
“We’ve just been deep. And
we’ve been that way all season
long,” Coach Bill Pribac s aid. “If we
had some injuries, we always had
everyone picking one another up
as we went along.”
The Cadets were trailing 7-1 in
the second set when junior out-
side hitter rachel richardson,
who finished with a game-high
15 kills, helped her team outscore
the T igers 24-5 to close o ut the s et.
“We started playing poorly,”
Pribac said. “We didn’t pass very
well at the beginning, but as soon
as we got it going, we started pull-
ing away.”
Pribac went with five seniors in
the l ineup for t he f inal set, and the
Cadets blew past Wilson — jump-
ing out to a 11-5 lead and never
looking back.
“We wanted to get all the seniorson the floor for one last hurrah,”
Pribac said. “Every time we’ve done
that, they didn’t disappoint. It was
a lot of fun to watch them finish off
their careers on the court.”
St. John’s this season was de-
fined by its depth. Whether it was
richardson pounding the ball
past defenders, senior maya
Boykin setting up teammates or
freshman middle hitter Pamela
mcCune coming off the b ench a nd
providing a spark, Pribac received
contributions from just about ev-
eryone h e called o n.
With a handful of underclass-
men getting varsity experience,
the coach is already thinking
about how the team will look next
season.
“We had a lot of them get a
chance to experience stuff on the
varsity level,” Pribac said. “They’re
going to be ready to step up next
year. We are going to have some
holes, but those holes are going to
be filled by the players that are
coming back.”
[email protected]D.c. StAte AtHletIc ASSocIAtIon VolleybAll cHAmPIonSHIP
C adets claim seventh straight crown
st. JOHN’s 3,
wILsON 0DOUg KAPUSTIN FOr THE wASHINgTON POSTst. Charles’s Klayton Batten breaks up a pass intended for Northern’s Cody Howard in Friday’s win.
ASSOCIATED PRESSAndrew Wiggins scored
40 points, hitting the tying basket
late in regulation, and the minne-
sota Timberwolves overcame
D’Angelo russell’s career-high
52 points to beat the Golden State
Warriors, 125-119, in overtime fri-
day night.
russell and the Warriors (2-7)
led 110-106 with 29 seconds left in
regulation. But after two free
throws by Karl-Anthony To wns
and a forced jump ball by robert
Covington, Wiggins tied it on a
drive with 5.6 seconds left. rus-
sell’s three-pointer at the buzzer
missed.
In overtime, Wiggins hit a
clinching three with 23 seconds
left t o help the Timberwolves (5-3)
snap a two-game l osing streak.
russell missed the previous
three games for injury-depleted
Golden S tate with a sprained right
ankle. His return gave the War-
riors their seventh different start-
ing lineup in 10 games. His previ-
ous career high was 44 points.
l JAzz 103, BUCKs 1 00: Bo-
jan Bogdanovic hit a three-point-
er as time expired for the last of his
33 points in Utah’s win over mil-
waukee (6-3) in Salt Lake C ity.
Bogdanovic made five three-
pointers and all 10 free throws,
and mike Conley and Donovan
mitchell each had 20 points for
the Jazz (6-3).
l NUGGETs 100, 76Ers 97:
Nikola Jokic hit an off-balanced
20-foot shot with 1.2 seconds re-
maining, helping host Denver
(6-2) rally from a 21-point, fourth-
quarter deficit to stun Philadel-
phia (5-3).It’s the largest fourth-quarter
comeback in team history.
Jokic finished with 26 points,
none bigger than his jumper from
the left s ide of the court with 76ers
players all over him. on the next
possession, the Nuggets big man
drew an offensive foul on Joel
Embiid. Will Barton then hit two
free throws to seal the win.
l KNICKs 106, MAVErICKs
103: marcus morris scored a sea-
son-high 29 points, and New York
(2-7) beat Kristaps Porzingis in
their f irst game against the former
cornerstone of the franchise,
holding off Dallas (5-3).
Porzingis scored 28 points and
Luka Doncic added a career-high
38 in his fourth triple-double, but
the mavericks didn’t get much
help from anyone else.
l rAPTOrs 122, PELICANs
104: Pascal Siakam matched his
career high with 44 points, and
To ronto won on the road against
New orleans.
The raptors used a 45-point
second quarter to take control of
the game and improved to 6-2.
The Pelicans slipped t o 1-7.
l PACErs 112, PIsTONs 106:
T. J. mcConnell, Domantas Sabon-
is and T. J. Warren scored 17 p oints
apiece, and injury-riddled Indi-
ana (5-4) moved above .500 for the
first time this s eason with a win in
Indianapolis over Detroit (4-6).
Indiana was without all-star
Victor oladipo, starting center
myles Turner and key reserves
Jeremy Lamb and Goga Bitadze.The Pacers have won five of six
after starting the season 0-3.
l KINGs 121 , HAwKs 109:
Bogdan Bogdanovic scored
20 points and hit two of his three-
pointers in a key fourth-quarter
flurry, and Sacramento (3-6)
fought off Atlanta’s comeback at-
tempt to win on t he road.
The Kings led by 21 points in
the second period before Trae
Young, who had 30 points, led the
Hawks’ second-half comeback.
Atlanta (3-5) cut Sacramento’s
lead to 94-93 before the Kings
answered with a string of five
three-pointers, including the two
by Bogdanovic.
Buddy Hield led the Kings with
22 points. De’Aaron fox had 17.
l MAGIC 118, GrIzzLIEs 86:
Nikola Vucevic had 23 points and
16 rebounds and Jonathan Isaac
added 22 points and eight re-
bounds as orlando snapped a
four-game losing streak with a
home win over memphis.
Evan fournier scored 19 points
and Aaron Gordon added 17 for
the magic (3-6), which outscored
memphis 34-8 in the fourth quar-
ter.
memphis, which had 1 37 points
in its last game, the second-high-
est total in franchise history, was
held under 100 for the second
time this season. The Grizzlies
(2-6) were 3-for-32 s hooting in the
fourth period.NBA fines smart $15,000
Boston guard marcus Smart
was fined $15,000 by the NBA for
public criticism of the officiating.
The NBA fined Smart a day after
his comments following the Celt-
ics’ 108-87 victory at C harlotte.nbA roUnDUPRussell scores 52, but it’s not enough
tIMBErwOLvEs 125,
wArrIOrs 119 (Ot)JONATHAN NEwTON/THE wASHINgTON POST
Thomas Bryant, looking to pass under pressure, scored a game-high 23 points on 11-for-16 shooting.Ha chimura, meanwhile,
played with renewed energy, hit-
ting his first seven shots — a mix
of scores in transition and confi-
dent pullup jumpers — and made
10 of 13 attempts for 21 points.
Along with center Thomas Bry-
ant, the two young frontcourt
players carried much of the offen-
sive load.
Bryant played closer to the rim
and scored 23 to go along with
eight rebounds. Before the game,
Brooks gave a frank answer to a
question about Bryant’s shot se-
lection. In the first seven games,
Bryant had attempted 20 three-
pointers compared with 24 shots
at the rim. for a player who once
made 14 o f 14 s hots (Dec. 22, 2018)
while capitalizing on finishes
near the rim, the new focus on
outside shooting rankled his
coach.
“You know, I don’t like it,”
Brooks said about Bryant’s choic-
es within the offense. “I think he’s
extremely exceptional going to
the basket and catching around
the paint... and I think we need
to shift it more toward that. He
knows. We talked about it multi-
ple games.”
on friday night, Bryant turned
the talk into action — and moved
much closer to the rim, where he
made all but three of his shots.
Despite the young players’
breakthrough, as a team the Wiz-least 10 in five of their eight
games, including the past three.
on Nov. 2 , the Wizards couldn’t
stop the minnesota Timber-
wolves and eventually trailed by- In Indianapolis on Wednes-
day night, the Pacers over-
whelmed the Wizards and built a
25-point lead. And in the Wizards’
only nationally televised game on
ESPN, the Cavaliers had a 21-
point cushion in the third quar-
ter, taking advantage of bad pos-
sessions and poor interior de-
fense, regularly getting to the free
throw line and generally domi-
nating the hosts.
In the first half, Cleveland
scored 13 points off 12 turnovers
and connected on 15 of 18 free
throws, compared with the Wiz-
ards’ two attempts from the foul
line.
“I blame all defense,” Beal said
of the large deficits. “Everybody
wants to say we’re missing shots
or whatever, but I mean, if we can
control making shots, we’d be
100 percent from the field. right?
So it’s defense. We’ve got to be
able to guard. Get back in transi-
tion and rebound. That’s what’s
killing us. Not turning the ball
over, too.”
Against the Cavaliers, Brooks
inserted 20-year-old Brown into
the starting lineup, replacing the
team’s youngest player, Isaac
Bonga, at small forward. Al-
though Brooks said the move did
not reflect on Bonga’s perfor-
mance as a starter, the change
happened a game after Bonga
and Hachimura both went score-
less in a loss to Indiana.
Bonga, who turned 20 on fri-
day, collected his first “DNP —
Coach’s decision,” and guard Jor-
dan mcrae played backup min-
utes behind Beal, giving the Wiz-
ards a sixth established veteran in
the 10-man rotation.
wIzArds from d1Wizards fail to stop younger Cavaliers
WIzArDS’ neXt tHreeat boston celticswednesday7:30 NBCSwat minnesota timberwolvesFr iday8NBCSw+at orlando magicNov. 17 6NBCSwRadio: WFED (1500 AM)cavaliers 113, Wizards 100
ClEVElaNd ....................... 3037212 5— 113
WaShINGtoN ................... 2626321 6— 100
ClEVElaNd: O sman 5-9 0-0 11, Love 3-6 10-13 16,
Thompson 8-12 5-6 21, Garland 6-11 2-2 15, Sexton 7-19
0-0 16, Nance Jr. 1-2 2-2 4, Dellavedova 2-6 2-2 7,
Clarkson 4-14 1-1 10, Porter Jr. 5-11 3-3 13. totals 4 1-90
25-29 113.
WaShINGtoN: B rown Jr. 1-8 0-0 3, Hachimura 10-13
1-2 21, Bryant 11-16 1-2 23, Thomas 5-9 0-0 11, Beal 8-21
1-2 20, Miles 0-7 0-0 0, Bertans 2-10 0-0 5, Wagner 4-6
0-0 8, Smith 3-4 0-0 7, McRae 1-2 0-0 2. totals 4 5-96 3-6
100.
three-point Goals: Cleveland 6-27 (Sexton 2-5, Garland
1-2, Osman 1-3, Dellavedova 1-4, Clarkson 1-7, Love 0-3,
Porter Jr. 0-3), Washington 7-31 (Beal 3-9, Smith 1-1,
Brown Jr. 1-2, Thomas 1-4, Bertans 1-8, Wagner 0-1,
Bryant 0-3, Miles 0-3). Fouled out: None. Rebounds:
Cleveland 48 (Love, Thompson 12), Washington 47
(Wagner, Bryant 8). assists: Cleveland 18 (Garland 6),
Washington 26 (Beal 9). total Fouls: Cleveland 17,
Washington 24. technicals: Clarkson, Washington coach
Wizards (Defensive three second), Washington coach
Scott Brooks, Bryant. a: 16,946 (20,356).