MANCHESTER— Monday's non-league clash between Manchester Essex and Snowden served as a potential state tournament preview. Both teams are heading to the Division 4 North State Tournament and according to Hornets head coach Duane Sigsbury, there is a very good chance the two teams could meet in the Division 4 North first round. Seedings for the tournament are announced on Friday.
While Manchester Essex didn't play its best, they still rallied in the fourth quarter for a 69-67 win at Manchester Essex High School.
With the win the Hornets improve to 18-2 and could be the top seed in Division 4 North.
"It's tough to get up for a game that will not hurt if you lose," Sigsbury said. "We didn't play our best but we didn't roll over and we came away with the win. Give credit to Snowden, they have some good players. It looks like we will meet them again and we will have to play better next time around."
Manchester Essex cruised to a 38-23 halftime lead but the wheels nearly came off in an disastrous third quarter where Snowden outscored them 26-6.
The Hornets scored the first bucket of the second half to take a 40-23 lead, their biggest of the game, but it was all Snowden for the remainder of the quarter. Manchester Essex went cold from the field shooting just 20% from the field in the frame and not scoring a single point over the final five minutes of the quarter. Snowden made them pay breaking out in transition and getting easy buckets. A 10-0 run cut the Hornets lead to 40-33 and Snowden wasn't done there as they controlled the glass and went on a 16-4 run to end the frame taking a 49-44 lead into the fourth quarter.
"We lost our emotion in the third," Hornets senior guard Joe Burgess said. "We thought the game was over when we took a 15 point lead into the half and it almost cost us."
Sigsbury was not happy with his team's third quarter defense after watching them play stellar defense in the first half.
"With the way we defended in the first half it was tough to see us defend the way we did in the second half, it wasn't very good," Sigsbury said. "We were standing around too much and we couldn't get any offense going because of the defense we were playing, and they made us pay like good teams do."
In the fourth quarter, however, the Hornets took over led by Burgess' 15 points and three 3-pointers. After Snowden extended the lead to seven, Manchester Essex slowly plugged away. A Burgess three pointer made it 55-53 Snowden in the middle of the frame and a Sean Nally layup tied the score at 55 with 3:41 to play. Another Burgess three made it 58-55 but Snowden came right back with a three of their own from Jaquan Smith to tie the score back up at 58.
A Snowden free throw with 3:13 left put hem on top by one, but it was all Hornets in the final three minutes as Burgess hit two more threes to give them the lead and Chris Bishop sunk two free throws to ice the game.
"We played our game in the fourth quarter," Burgess said. "We started penetrating and kicking it out to the corner. We are at our best when we play that way."
Following a back and forth first quarter that saw the Hornets take a 16-14 lead, the home team kicked it up a notch in the second quarter.
After Snowden pulled to within one point at 24-23, the Hornets went on a 14-0 run to end the half, the highlight being a buzzer beating deep three pointer from Chris Bishop. Max Nesbit also picked up several key buckets in the Hornets second quarter run.
"I may have been hot in the fourth quarter," Burgess said. "But Bishop and Nesbit were hot early on. This was a total team win. We played as a team every quarter besides the third."
Burgess led all scorers with 22 points, Bishop scored 18 and Nesbit had 15, Casey Weld also chipped in 10 rebounds. Paul Maurice led Snowden with 20 points and 13 rebound, they had three other players score in double figures.
Manchester Essex 69 Snowden 67
at Manchester Essex High School, Manchester
S: Nelson Kady 2-0-4, Paul Maurice 8-3-20, Kareem Murrell 3-3-10, Francis Depina 4-1-10, Javaugh Kittrell 4-3-12, Jaquan Smith 4-1-11.
ME: Chris Bishop 7-2-18, Sean Nally 4-0-8, Casey Weld 3-0-6, Max Nesbit 6-0-15, Joe Burgess 7-3-22.
3-pointers: S, Maurice, Murrell, Depina, Kittrell, Smith 2; ME, Bishop 2, Nesbit 3, Burgess 5.
Halftime: ME 38-23
Records: ME 18-2
