Above: Greenwood’s Cade Stinnett (right) shoots Friday during the Gators’ 60-54 win over Warren East at GHS. Below: Greenwood’s Jack Roberts shoots Friday.

Cade Stinnett’s night started with a crown as part of the freshman homecoming court. Then he owned the court, making his presence felt to carry Greenwood to an important district win.

Stinnett scored 16 points and was the key to the Gators’ 60-54 win over Warren East on Friday. The freshman scored 11 points in the second half to help Greenwood (8-8 overall, 2-2 District 14) rally from an eight-point deficit in the second half and give Warren East (8-10, 0-3) its sixth straight loss.

“I felt really good,” Stinnett said. “First half we struggled on offense and I tried to help get offensive rebounds and tried to do my hustle. Started to push off their press and we could take it to the hole and that’s what I’m best at.

“It was a big district win. We needed it for trying to get the two-seed in the district tournament. With the homecoming crowd, it was a good win for us.”

Ben Carroll led the Gators with 19 points and fouled out with two minutes left. Carroll scored nine points in the third quarter when the Gators found their rhythm. Carroll’s production was expected with his usual role with Greenwood – it’s Stinnett that’s been the welcome surprise.

Gators coach Bob Pels said the freshman was barely able to compete with the speed and physicality of the varsity level. An injury to Jack Roberts in mid-December gave Stinnett a chance to step in and compete.

Roberts rejoined the team Tuesday in a win at Todd County Central and is working his way back into the rotation after missing a month of action. Stinnett has averaged 12 points in his last four games and been that spark Greenwood needs to get going after losing four straight over the holidays.

“He’s doing more and getting confident,” Pels said. “Cade might not have gotten much of an opportunity if Jack had stayed there. We didn’t want him to get hurt, obviously, but you have to take advantage of what you’ve got. You could see it in practice. The skill set and the effort was there, he just couldn’t finish. We told him, ‘You’re doing exactly what you have to do, just keep going.’ ”

Carroll got the ball rolling with a 3-pointer and the Gators found a quick 9-4 lead. Warren East took six minutes to make its first field goal from Seth Blaine and weaved its way into a 11-9 lead after one quarter thanks to 5-of-6 shooting from the free throw line.

Freshman Kaleb Matlock helped keep the momentum with the Raiders in the second quarter. His back-to-back 3s and two free throws put Warren East in front 21-16 at the 3:49 mark of the second quarter.

Greenwood tied it at 21-all after Stinnett made the most of a lucky bounce of the ball off an official in play and turned it into a three-point play.

Thomas Maxey hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer to give the Raiders a 26-21 lead at halftime.

“The first half may have been the best half of defensive basketball we’ve played all season,” WEHS coach Brandon Combs said.

The lead shifted throughout the third quarter. Carroll had an individual 7-0 run to bring the Gators within 35-34 and Park Williams scored on a driving floater to put Greenwood ahead. Maxey gave the lead back to Warren East briefly with two free throws, but the Gators reclaimed the edge when Stinnett scored on a putback at the buzzer.

The Raiders slowly chipped back with Maxey’s back-to-back scores cutting the Gators lead to 49-46 with 2:46 left. Carroll fouled out with two minutes left and the Gators sealed the win with free throws in the end.

Matlock led Warren East with 15 points.

“We’ve got to get this taste out of our mouth now,” Combs said. “We’re tired of losing. A lot to build on tonight. It stinks because we lost but we did a lot of good things tonight.”

WEHS 11 15 11 17 – 54

GHS 9 12 17 22 – 60

WEHS – Matlock 15, Barber 14, Maxey 12, Wallace 5, Carter 4, Harrell 2, Blaine 2

GHS – Carroll 19, Stinnett 16, Williams 12, Roberts 7, I. Stansbury 4, N. Stansbury 2

Girls

Greenwood 51,

Warren East 45

Greenwood earned its first District 14 win with a solid defensive effort to top Warren East 51-45 on Friday.

The Lady Gators (8-8 overall, 1-3 District 14) led by as many as 14 behind 14 points from Carly Miller and 13 points Jacqueline Jackson, who was honored after the game for scoring her 1,000th career point against Green County on Dec. 21.

Miller added eight rebounds and four blocks on a night Greenwood made the paint a primary focus.

“The keys to the win tonight were controlling the pace and controlling the paint,” GHS coach Zach Simpson said. “We couldn’t let them outrebound us. Defensively we were right where we needed to be. Biggest takeaway from tonight was how we played defense and how well we guarded.”

Warren East (7-12, 1-3) took a while to get going by not scoring until 3:53 left in the first quarter on Katelyn Joiner’s post-up. Despite hitting just one field goal, Greenwood kept it tight with six free throws to trail 10-8 after one quarter.

The Lady Gators finally found the net from the floor by hitting five of their first seven field goals of the second quarter. The two teams traded leads until Carly Miller’s putback gave Greenwood a 27-24 halftime lead.

Greenwood kept that solid shooting streak going and extended the lead by 12 points going into the final eight minutes. Between the second and third quarters, Greenwood shot 16-of-24 from the field.

Greenwood stretched the lead to 14 points and Warren East, despite outscoring the Lady Gators 13-7 in the fourth quarter, found its groove too late.

Patterson fell short of a double-double with 14 points and nine rebounds. Caroline Forrester had 13 rebounds and nine points for the Lady Raiders.

WEHS 10 14 8 13 – 45

GHS 8 19 17 7 – 51

WEHS – Patterson 14, Hymer 7, Forrester 8, Bailey 7, Price 5, Miller 2, Joiner 2

GHS – Miller 14, Jackson 13, Une 9, Milam 7, Trinh 6, Gordon 2

– Follow sports reporter Elliott Pratt on Twitter @EPrattBGDN or visit bgdailynews.com.