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Highlands Today

Streaks Strive For Perfection

Chris Hoffman/Highlands Today

Sebring's Chris Grubb drives past Lake Placid's Avery Young during the Jim Taveniere Holiday Tournament on Friday.

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By CHRIS HOFFMAN

Highlands Today

Published: December 21, 2008

SEBRING - Treating every game like an elimination game is something Sebring boys basketball head coach Princeton Harris has been trying to instill in his Blue Streaks from day one, and Friday was no exception.

"I want these kids to treat every game like it was a playoff game," said Harris whose Streaks rolled to a 64-37 victory over Lake Placid on the opening night of the Jim Taveniere Holiday Tournament. "We have to maintain a consistent level of intensity no matter if we're up by 50 or down by 50.

"I want the very best these kids have to offer."

Harris made that point especially clear to his players during halftime, when the Streaks were up by 20 points but lacked the defensive pressure and proper execution Harris demanded pregame.

"I wanted to make Lake Placid work on every possession. I didn't want any breakdowns or mental lapses like I saw tonight," said the SHS coach. "These games that seem like easy wins are the perfect time to establish good habits and to break bad ones.

"We were being too lackadaisical on the court, but I thought we did a much better job of buckling down and running our offense in the second half."

The Streaks jumped out to a 10-0 lead by using a half-court press that forced countless Green Dragon turnovers and led to easy baskets.

Sebring's Joe Young followed a miss by Jewel Campbell with a two-handed dunk that forced Lake Placid to call a timeout moments into the game.

Young would finish with 11 points and 10 rebounds, while his frontcourt mate, Campbell, had six points and was a defensive force in the paint, grabbing 10 rebounds and blocking five shots on the night.

The game plan for Sebring was to work the inside/outside game with the offense to run through the big men in the middle, as guard Chris Grubb had the task of getting Young and Campbell into a rhythm early.

"Coach Harris knows the guards can knock down shots, but he wanted to really work on getting the ball into the middle and build more chemistry between the guards and the big men," Grubb said. "During the playoffs, we need to have a strong presence in the middle and we need to work on getting Joe and Jewel comfortable in the offense instead of just snagging our missed shots."

The chemistry between Young and Campbell has been taking shape over the course of the season, with the two big men working in concert with one another to form a defensive wall in the paint.

But as the holiday season arrives and the district playoffs loom, Harris wants to see more offensive fireworks from the duo.

"They're too good to just be there to block shots and rebound. I don't even think they know how good they can be together," Harris said. "There's potential in both of them that we haven't even tapped.

"It's going to be real exciting when they're firing on all cylinders."

Young agreed.

"I like the chemistry that Jewel and I have, but I think we're still learning how the other plays," Young said. "We both are very defensive-minded players, but I really think that we can be a lot better on offense and that's going to give our team a whole other look.

"We just need to work on doing the little things and never forget that defense is what wins titles."

The game plan for Sebring was slow going as Lake Placid did a good job of collapsing on the middle and forcing the Streaks to take some tough outside shots.

On the flip side, Lake Placid's young team had trouble with Sebring's pressure defense and coughed the ball up too much early, which helped the Streaks build a 27-8 first quarter lead.

LP head coach David Veley is going to take advantage of the holiday break to work on the fundamentals with his team and hopefully stabilize their ball handling and guard play before heading into district play next month.

"We're a work in progress right now," Veley said. "We're very young at key areas of our team and it's just going to take time to get better as a team. We need to work on being a better rebounding team and also learn to box out. Those are fundamental skills that we need to address during the next few weeks."

Forward Andre Wilson with 12 points led Lake Placid and senior Avery Young and Edwin Velezquez each had five points in the loss.

"I've seen a glimmer of good play from our kids in the past few weeks," Veley said. "There would be moments in the games where we'd make good decisions and really put things together. I saw some of those moments tonight. We just need to work on putting all the pieces together.

"We played these games against tough competition for the sole purpose of getting better as a team and it will help us to not be intimidated when we face the teams in our district. The second season district schedule begins in the New Year and that's when we need to be playing our best."

Sebring's Devin Clarke led all scorers with 19, while Tevin Toney came off the bench to score eight points for the Streaks.

The Taveniere tourney wrapped up on Saturday with Sebring scheduled to face Lake Wales in a rematch of Thursday's game, while Lake Placid played Walker Academy.

See Monday's Highlands Today for a complete recap of all the action.

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