Green Dragons Heat Up, Rout Seminoles

The Lake Placid boys basketball team appears to be coming together at the right time.

The Green Dragons placed four players in double figures while routing Sonrise Christian by a score of 70-51 on Monday night.The win avenged an early-season loss to the Seminoles and gives the Green Dragons a shot of confidence heading into next week's Class 3A-District 10 tournament.

"This was a good win for us," said first-year Lake Placid coach David Veley. "Sonrise's top scorer averages 30 points a game and we held him to only nineteen.

"It was close at the half, but we turned up the defensive pressure, knocked down some shots and probably played one of our best games of the season."

Sonrise jumped out to an early 12-2 lead, but Lake Placid chipped away at the Seminoles lead over the next few minutes.

The Green Dragons were led by Kirk Veley's 19 points and they battled back to take a 35-30 lead at the half.

Lake Placid came out with renewed intensity to start the second half and worked the ball inside to take advantage of its height advantage inside the paint.

Senior forward Travalier Sholtz scored 15 points and hauled down 11 rebounds, Avery Young chipped in with 13 and Andre Wilson added 12 as the Green Dragons pulled away from the Seminoles.

"We pounded the ball inside to take advantage of our height," said Coach Veley. "We showed good patience, ran the floor well and forced Sonrise into making some turnovers.

"We hit some three-pointers to open the fourth quarter to build a big lead and it was nice to be able to relax and enjoy the final minutes of the game."

Lake Placid plays its last regular season game at Sebring on Friday night and then the Green Dragons compete in the district tournament at McKeel Academy on Feb. 13.

"We still don't know who we play in the first round of the tournament yet," said Coach Veley. "It's either going to be Frostproof or Mulberry, but it really doesn't matter.

"We're confident playing either one of them even though we didn't beat them during the regular season because we're much improved and we're playing our best ball of the season."

The Dragons' final regular season game will be held at 7 p.m. on Friday at Sebring.