Gaston College struggles with rebounding, turnovers in loss to Wake Tech

Allowing too many second chance opportunities and having too many empty offensive possessions were too much for Gaston College's basketball team to overcome Monday night in a 70-64 loss to Wake Tech at Gastonia's Ashbrook High School gymnasium.

The visiting Eagles collected 14 offensive rebounds and forced 13 turnovers in a hotly-contested Region 10 Division I game whose outcome dropped the Rhinos to 19-7 overall and 5-6 in league play.

"We knew this week, especially Monday and Wednesday, we couldn't give up as many offensive rebounds as we did in the first games against Wake Tech and Salkehatchie," Gaston College coach Benny Moss said. "We're down a couple of big guys but you've got to compete. All five guys have to get in there, compete and rebound.
"We gave up 11 offensive rebounds in the first half and made seven turnovers. That's too many. So they had a lot of extra possessions in the first half. We can talk Xs and Os all we want but we've got get on the glass, we've got to compete and we've got to rebound and get stops."

The Rhinos trailed throughout much of the contest, including by a game-high 54-39 with 9:52 to play before forging a comeback.

Gaston College went on a 13-2 surge to close within 54-50 with 7 1/2 minutes to play and had an unsuccessful possession with the chance to get even closer. After Wake Tech rebuilt its lead to 63-55 with 3:23 to play, the Rhinos got as close as five in the final minutes of the game. Gaston College has rallied from double digit deficits to take victories 10 times this season.

Sophomore Jordan Brown (19 points, 3 rebounds, 5 assists), sophomore Judah Ravenell (14 points, 8 rebounds), sophomore Tyheim Love (12 points), freshman E.J. Joyner (7 points, 3 rebounds, 3 assists), freshman Ryan Evans (5 points, 7 rebounds, 2 blocks) and freshman Kyhree McAlister (5 points, 8 rebounds, 3 blocks) led a balanced Gaston College attack.

After Wednesday's 7 p.m. game at USC Salkehatchie, the Rhinos visits Brunswick Community College on Saturday at 3 p.m. before closing out their regular season with their home finale on March 5 against Caldwell Tech at Gastonia's Ashbrook High School.

"We've got to keep them off the foul line," Moss said of Wednesday's game. "Last time we played Salkehatchie (in a 104-100 loss), we gave them 46 free throw attempts. So we've got to go down there and not give up so many free throws and offensive rebounds or we'll have another tough night."