Charleston rolls past Portageville as Clark reaches milestone

CHARLESTON, Mo. -- Coming into Friday's matchup against Portageville, Charleston junior Mardareyon Clark stood just seven points from hitting the 1,000 point milestone in his varsity career.

It took Clark just four minutes into the contest to meet that mark, finishing with a game-high 21 points as the Bluejays routed the visiting Bulldogs 74-43 on homecoming night.

"It felt good," Clark said of his achievement. "I didn't even know I was that close to 1,000 points until like a couple days ago. People were telling me and I got excited."

Fans didn't have to wait long for Clark to end the anticipation, scoring seven-straight points in the first four minutes.

Clark grabbed in his own rebound and scored on the second attempt to cap a 9-1 rally with 4:02 still left in the first quarter. He finished the half with 17 points to help his team build a 30-point halftime lead, 48-17, shooting 9 of 16 on the game while collecting nine rebounds and three assists.

Portageville's best chance at slowing down Clark, 6-5 junior Ian Torrey, got in foul trouble early. He collected his third foul just three minutes into the second quarter, forcing him to miss significant minutes before the break.

"Clark is going to be a tough matchup regardless," Portageville head coach Jason Irby said. "But once Ian went out we didn't really have anybody size-wise that could match him and he just went to work on the inside on us. He dominated the paint."

Defense fueled the Bluejays dominant start, holding Portageville to just one field goal and doubling them up on shots 16-6 in the first quarter.

Charleston ended the first quarter hitting on 7 of 8 attempts for a 15-0 run to enter the second leading 23-3.

Portageville slowed the bleeding in the second quarter, but still trailed by a large margin at halftime.

"Our number one game key tonight was not to get knocked out in the first five minutes," Irby said. "Because the last few times we've come over here that's what happened and it happened again tonight. They didn't even really press us as far as full court. We just struggled in our half court to run our offense.

"The thing I thought really killed us is early in the game they were missing some outside shots and tracking down every offensive rebound. We just couldn't rebound with them and that killed us."

The second half was kinder for Portageville as they outscored Charleston 14-10 in the third quarter. They never got any closer than 24-points, however, and by the end of the fouth quarter the Bluejays had kicked the turboclock in.

Along with getting Torrey in foul trouble the Bluejays held him to 10 points, only two of which came in the first half.

As a team Charleston shot 29 of 63 (46 percent) from the field and 10 of 29 (34 percent) from 3-point range. Portageville shot 17 of 49 (35 percent) from the floor on the game, including a 1 of 8 mark in the first quarter.

Bub Lance's 15 points led the way for the Bulldogs, scoring 11 points after the half and hitting three 3-pointers. Torrey's 10 points left him second on the team and Hunter Gates finished with seven points.

With just a week to go before the postseason the Bluejays sit at 20-5 and Portageville drops to 13-9. They'll enter the Class 3, District 1 Tournament as the number one and sixth seeds respectively.

Portageville is set to play at Holcomb Monday and night, and Tuesday for their last home game hosting Bloomfield.

Last Tuesday night, Portageville hosted the Kelly Hawks and won, 74-54.

Portageville 3 14 14 12 - 43

Charleston 23 25 10 16 -74

PORTAGEVILLE (43) -- Hunter Gates 7, Luke Darst 4, Ian Torrey 10, Daniel Carter 5, Bub Lance 15, Alex Riddle 2. FG 17, FG 5-8, F 7. (3-pointers: Torrey 1, Lance 3. Fouled out: none)

CAPE CENTRAL (74) -- Jaquavis Rodgers 6, Samuel Bledsoe 8, Preston Moore 3, Latrell Porter 1, Demarcus Sharp 14, Mardareyon Clark 21, Jeremy Tucker 8, Niqilas Ranson 6, Delontre Gillespie 4, Ke'Sean Griffin 3. FG 29, FT 6-8, F 11. (3-pointers: Rodgers 2, Bledsoe 2, Moore 1, Sharp 1, Tucker 2, Ranson 2. Fouled out: none)