By ANDREW FAISON/CORRESPONDENT
andrew.faison@yahoo.com

COURTLAND—Southampton High School boys defeated the Nottoway 75-65 in a Southside District competition Wednesday night.

“We played a lot better defensively this time,” said Indians’ Coach Will Melbye when comparing an earlier game between the teams.

“We didn’t allow them to knock down as many threes even though they 22 (T. Reavis) and 2 (C.J. Felder) did knock down a few in the second half, but we were able to knock down a few as well,” Melbye added.

Southampton improved to 10-4 on the season as well as 6-4 in the district. Nottoway fell to 7-8.

Leading the way for Southampton was Nick Doyle with 22 points; he went 6-of-8 from the free-throw line. Josh Johnson added 16 points and Jalen Ford, 14.

Southampton was the first on the board with a tip-in by Ford off an offensive rebound. The quarter remained close with neither team pulling more than 4 points ahead. The quarter ended with Southampton leading 21-19.

After being down by 6 in the second quarter, the Indians brought the score to within 1 point of the Cougars before going on a 6-point run to end the first half with Southampton leading 41-36.

Indian Jay’R McCain opened up the third quarter with an offensive rebound. With 3:37 left in the quarter, Johnson was fouled while going up for a lay-up, but was unable to capitalize on the “and 1” attempt. This capped off a 12-3 run by the Indians.

The Indians outscored the Cougars 18-8 in the third quarter; the quarter ended with Southampton leading 59-44.

“We played a lot better and rebounded a lot better in the second half than in the first half,” said Melbye.

Southampton will travel to Parkview on Friday, Feb. 4, for another district competition; game time is 7:30 p.m. The Indians will host Franklin on Saturday, Feb. 5, as part of the rescheduled four-game tournament.

The Windsor game scheduled for Monday has been canceled due to the rescheduling of the Powhatan game that had to be postponed due to inclement weather in the Richmond area last week.

“We still have a full slate ahead of us,” said Melbye. “With having to play six games in 10 days, we have a lot of work to do, and then we head to the tournament from there and that will be on that following Monday.”

“Four out of our final 5 games are district games,” he added.