Cards defense decks Rams

CARBONDALE For all thats been made about the scoring ability of the Grand Valley High School boys basketball team, its the Cardinals defense that paved the way for that scoring Friday night against the Roaring Fork Rams.

Sam Parker and Gunner Rigsby each finished with a game-high 22 points for the eighth-ranked Cardinals, who took a big lead early thanks to its transition game on their way to a 72-56 Class 3A Western Slope League victory at the Roaring Fork High gymnasium.

Thats our main focus is to play good D and get out on the break, Rigsby, a sophomore, said. Everyone on this team has been working their hardest on defense every since weve been together. We were iffy on defense last year but, now that weve gotten it down, were starting to see a lot more success.

Thats definitely the case for the No. 8 Cardinals (7-1 overall, 3-0 3A WSL), who used that transition game to lead by double figures at the end of the first quarter and lead by as much as 30 by the halfway point of the third quarter. That also resulted in a balanced scoring attack for Grand Valley as well: Tanner Magee added 13 points and John Parker chipped in 10.

The kids have really dedicated themselves to team defense, Grand Valley coach Scott Parker said. I felt that we were in the right place defensively most of the time tonight. And when we play defense like that, were pretty good in transition.

Ben Carpenter had a team-high 16 points with four 3-pointers, Chering Sherpa added 12 and Adrian Chavez chipped in 11 points for the Rams (6-3 overall, 3-1 league), who lost their first league game of the season. Roaring Forks starting five was so displeased with its performance after the game that, during the final half of the fourth quarter, it huddled together at the end of the Rams bench.

I have no clue what they said to each other, Roaring Fork coach Larry Williams said. Im assuming, though, that it was something along the lines of Lets not let something like this happen again. We have good leadership on this team, and I know these guys will look forward to the challenge of playing these guys again.

The Cardinals made things challenging from the beginning.

Thanks to that first-quarter defensive effort, Grand Valley opened the game on a 19-4 run that was capped by a putback from Magee with 1 minute 55 seconds remaining in the first quarter. And the Cardinals didnt let up, either, pushing the lead to 36-15 on a 3-pointer from Sam Parker with 1:54 left before halftime. The Cardinals biggest lead was 32 points, which came after a pair of 3s from Rigsby and a jumper from Magee.

Theyre a good team and they worked hard, said Rigsby, who finished with four of the Cardinals nine 3-pointers. We just tried to come out and play our hardest from the get go, and this was the outcome.

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Cards defense decks Rams