Dedmer's 47 leads Cougars past Trojans

By Tony Burns

Sports Editor

FORDYCE - Andreus Dedmer scored 47 points Friday night to lead Lafayette County to a 68-38 win over Parkers Chapel in the championship game of the 8-2A District Tournament.

The Trojans scored the first four points of the game before Lafayette County reeled off a 13-0 run. The Cougars led 32-18 at the half and 44-35 going into the fourth.

Dedmer scored 17 points in the fourth, including four of his six 3-pointers.

After the game, PC coach Josh Langley was asked the obvious question. How do you stop Dedmer?

“That’s a good question,” he answered. “We played ‘em three times now. The first half, we’ve had him stopped, five or six points. Went and tried to use the same game plan we used in the first half of both of those ball games. I mean, the kid can just play. You can double him. You can trap him. It doesn’t matter what you do. If you give him space, he’s going to shoot it on you. You run him off the 3-point line, he’s going to take it to the rim. He’s a great finisher. There’s really not a whole lot you can do to stop him.

"He scored 31 on us the first time, 26 the second time. We thought we were making progress. He definitely proved me wrong so it’s back to the drawing board on trying to stop him.”

The Trojans made runs of their own. Back to back 3-pointers by Preston Stivender and Caleb Jacobs cut the deficit to eight early in the third. But, Dedmer hit a 3-pointer and scored seven straight for the Cougars.

PC used an 8-0 spurt to pull to within 41-35 late in the third. But, Dedmer converted a three-point play to end the quarter and opened the fourth with two long 3-pointers.

Terrell Malone led Parkers Chapel with 10 points.

“I thought they won the loose ball battle. I don’t think it was from lack of effort. The ball just kind of bounced their way a lot,” said Langley. “They were allowed to play real handsy on defense. Our guards kind of fumbled around, turned it over a little too much. They definitely won the turnover battle. That’s another thing we have to improve on. Even when teams are allowed to play physical on us, we have to take care of that ball and find a way to get it inside. When we did get it inside, we didn’t finish. I thought we got contact on some of it but sometimes you’ve got to finish through that contact.”

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