Hawks down St. Vincent; earn first win of season

Kelly's Eric Turley tries to drive around St. Vincent's Josh Rollet (Photos by Josh Mills, Staff)

BENTON -- The Kelly Hawks basketball team took care of business Friday night by defeating the St. Vincent Indians by a score of 52-47.

"I think tonight was the best game we've played so far," Kelly head coach Nate Wills said. "We've made a lot more progress in the last two days and the kids came out hungry tonight."

The Hawks jumped out to an early lead on the Indians, leading after the first quarter by nine points, 15-6.

Over the next three quarters however, St. Vincent bounced back and actually led in scoring in two of the remaining quarters, making the young Kelly squad play their strongest defensive game to hold on for the victory.

The lead for the Hawks at half was 29-22.

Kelly's Josh DeBrock goes up for two of his 21 points Friday night

The Indians eventually cut the lead to two points after the third quarter, 38-

36, and early into the fourth quarter grabbed the lead for the first time, but only momentarily.

It was the 21 points of Josh DeBrock that led the way for the Hawks in the win, followed by 10 from fellow starter Levi Felter. DeBrock hit two big 3-

pointers, while Felter was a calm 4-for-5 at the charity stripe.

"We knew that after the Portageville game we had a lot of work to do," Wills said. "The great thing about the kids here is (that) they're committed to succeeding on the court."

"I told them after Tuesday night, that we've got to fix a lot of stuff," he added. "They came in at 7 a.m. and we watched the tape together, and they got to see on film what we needed to work on. We came in Wednesday and Thursday and went to work."

The Indians struggled with turnovers early in the game, until Josh Rollet took control, scoring 18 of his 20 points after the first quarter of play.

Kelly shot 8-for-11 as a team from the free throw line, while St. Vincent went 6-for-11.

Wills had nothing but praise for his team's effort in the win.

"We came in with great attitudes after a tough loss," Wills said. "(It was) a loss that was kind of ugly on our part, and we went to work, and it really paid dividends tonight and paid off."

Wills commented on the St. Vincent squad, noting that they are a big and physical team, and that Friday's game being their first of the year, that they (St. Vincent) had a lot to look forward to in the coming weeks.

Kelly will now travel to Twin Rivers on Tuesday night.