By By Adam Robinson – sports editor
Prior to the fourth quarter of action in Thursday night's game between the W.S Neal Eagles and the Flomaton Hurricanes, the question to be asked of both teams was:
Good defenses or poor offenses?
At the end of the first quarter, it was 11-6 Flomaton. At the end of the second quarter, it was 12-11 W.S. Neal. At the end of the third quarter, it was 22-18 Flomaton.
In quarters one through three there were only 40 points scored between the two teams, and in the fourth quarter there were 27 combined points scored (15 for Flomaton and 12 for W.S. Neal) - only 13 points less than the three prior quarters combined.
Final score? It was 37-30 Flomaton.
In the game Thursday night, Flomaton jumped out to an early 7-0 lead with 5:30 left in the first quarter.
W.S. Neal cut the lead to 7-4 with 4:27 left in the quarter after Chris Payne and William Shell each scored two points for the Eagles on back-to-back possessions.
Flomaton got those two points back on their next two possessions as they held an 11-4 lead with 3:18 left in the first before Payne added two points for the Eagles at the buzzer to cut the lead to 11-6 at the end of the first quarter.
The second quarter was all W.S. Neal as they held the Flomaton Hurricane offense scoreless in the quarter while taking a 6-0 run to hold a one-point lead at the half at 12-11.
Rashad Crook and Kendrick Floyd paced the Eagles in the quarter as they each had points. Crook had four in the quarter while Floyd added two.
In the third quarter of play, Flomaton took back the 6-0 run posted by the Eagles in the second quarter to take a 6-0 run of their own and take a 17-12 lead with 2:41 left in the third.
Jeremy Nicholson got the Eagles back on the board with two quick points on two consecutive possessions for Eagles as they cut the lead to 17-16 with 1:59 left in the third.
Flomaton then added two points to take a 19-16 lead, but Crook connected on two free throws for the Eagles to cut the lead to one point again. A 3-pointer for the Hurricanes with six seconds left gave the Hurricanes held a four-point lead at 22-18 heading into the fourth quarter of play.
In the fourth quarter, both teams offenses began to show as W.S. Neal broke away from their “six” theme as doubled their points to 12 in the quarter and Flomaton scored 15.
After Flomaton built a 31-22 lead at the 4:02 mark, W.S. Neal went on a 5-0 run to cut the lead to 31-27 with 2:08 left in the game and then cut the lead to 33-30 with 1:30 left after a 3-pointer by Bob Elliott.
That was the closest the Eagles would get and the final points of the game for the Eagles as Flomaton hit 4-of-6 free throws over the final 1:30 of the game to take the 37-30 win.
Jeremy Nicholson led the Eagles with nine points as Chris Payne followed with eight points.
Flomaton was 7-of-12 from free throw range as the Eagles were 3-of-12 in the game.
W.S. Neal was scheduled to end its regular season Friday night at home against Georgiana Friday night and will play in the class 4A area two tournament at Andalusia beginning Friday at 7:30 against Andalusia.