BATON ROUGE -- Walker did everything in its power to take a three-point lead into halftime of Tuesday’s District 4-5A encounter at defending district champion Scotlandville.
The Wildcats made 56% of their shots from the floor, Jalen Perkins and Jalen Cook enjoyed promising starts and the team’s defense helped limit one of the nation’s top players to just 5 first-half points.
Two-thirds of that equation for Walker to register a program-defining victory played out for another quarter until the other part of that formula – Scotlandville’s Ja’Vonte Smart – foiled the Wildcats’ hopes.
Regarded as one of the nation’s top guards, Smart showed why when he responded with 32 of his game-high 37 points in the second half, scoring 23 alone in the fourth quarter to propel Scotlandville to an 84-70 victory.
“I felt like the first 4 or 5 minutes of the third quarter would be the story and at that point I thought we were going to keep it close,” Walker coach Anthony Schiro said. “Maybe we just got a little tired at the end, playing as hard as we did. The adrenaline maybe left late and we just couldn’t sustain it.”
Schiro didn’t discount the impact that Smart, a member of Team USA’s gold medal-winning age-group teams that past two summers, had on the final outcome.
Smart went 8-for-11 from the field in the final 16 minutes and made four 3-pointers, some of those attempts from well beyond the arc.
The 6-foot-4 junior scored all but two of Scotlandville’s 25 fourth-quarter points, helping to fuel a 16-5 run over a 2-minute span of the final quarter where the Hornets (22-1, 3-0) opened a 72-61 lead with 4:01 to play.
“We needed to run some double teams at him and try and get the ball out of his hands,” Schiro said of Walker’s defensive approach that worked against Smart in the first half. “The guy made some shots that were contested. Once he got going, he hit some shots that you would think a normal player wouldn’t even take. That’s how the cards fell.”
The elevation of Smart’s game came at a time when Walker (17-7, 2-1) had to play 5½ minutes without Perkins, who picked up his fourth foul with 1:41 to go in the third quarter.
Prior to Smart’s two free throws Perkins, who finished with 23 points, had given Walker its largest lead of 56-52 on an alley-oop slam on an inbounds play.
The Hornets closed out the third quarter on a 7-0 run and opened a 59-56 lead when Smart hit a pair of free throws and 3-pointers sandwiched around a Jacobi Scott free throw.
An inside basket from Cook, who led Walker with 25, reduced Scotlandville’s lead to 64-59 with just under 7 minutes remaining when Smart rattled off nine points with a pair of long-distance 3’s and a three-point play for a 72-61 advantage.
Perkins re-entered the game during Scotlandville’s flurry with 4:42 left and immediately scored and was fouled on a driving lay-up, but was unable to complete the three-point opportunity.
The Wildcats called timeout with 3:02 showing after Cook’s 3-pointer left the Wildcats looking up at a 75-66 deficit, but they were unable to get any closer than 78-70 after Perkins’ lay-in with 1:28 to play.
“I had confidence,” Perkins said. “I just told myself they couldn’t guard me.”
Both teams set a frenzied pace by shooting over 50% in the first quarter with Scotlandville making five of its 10 3-pointers and getting a dunk from Malik Williams for a 25-21 lead.
Five different players contributed to Walker’s 12-4 run midway through the second quarter, erasing a 32-25 deficit for a 37-36 edge after Cook’s two free throws with 55.7 seconds left until halftime.
Cook and Perkins, who combined for 20 of Walker’s 41 first-half points, gave the Wildcats a 41-38 halftime lead, each knocking down perimeter jump shots -- capped by Perkins’ attempt just before the buzzer.
“The big thing for us is to move forward and not have a letdown the next game,” Schiro said of Friday’s home game with Denham Springs High, which is 2-1 in district after rolling past Central 60-47 on Tuesday.
“This was a game our guys had all the confidence in the world that we could compete and we did for 3½ quarters. I told the guys they beat us by 14, but the game was a lot closer than that.”
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SCOTLANDVILLE 84, WALKER 70
Walker 21 20 15 14 -- 70
Scotlandville 25 13 21 25 -- 84
Walker (70) -- Jalen Cook 10 3-3 25, Jalen Perkins 11 1-2 23, Darius Hampton 4 0-0 10, Josh Cook 2 1-1 5, Jacobi Scott 2 1-2 5, Dalton Moore 1 0-0 2. Totals 30 6-8 70.
Scotlandville (84) – Ja’Vonte Smart 10 12-14 37, Lamarq Williams 7 0-3 14, Jaylen Hawkins 5 0-0 13, Malik Williams 4 0-0 9, Reece Beekman 1 3-4 6, Levi Lewis 2 1-1 5. Totals 29 16-22 84.
3-point goals -- Walker 4 (Hampton 2, Ja. Cook 2), Scotlandville 10 (Smart 5, Hawkins 3, M. Williams 1, Beekman). Total fouls -- Walker 17, Scotlandville 14. Records: Walker 17-7, 2-1 District 4-5A; Scotlandville 22-1, 3-0. Up next: Denham Springs High at Walker, 7 p.m. Friday; Live Oak at Scotlandville, 7 p.m. Friday.
