Northwest Boys Hang On Against Richard Montgomery

Monday’s effort by the Northwest boys basketball team received mixed reviews. Regardless of opinion, the Jaguars kept alive their goal of a top-four playoff seed.

Northwest established an early lead against Richard Montgomery, extended its advantage to 24 points and then held on for a 62-52 victory at Northwest High School. The Jaguars improved to 9-7 (7-4 in the division) and are competing with several teams for the No. 4 seed in the 4A West region and a guaranteed home playoff game. Any team finishing outside of the top four is seeded at random. Springbrook, Magruder and Churchill figure to be the top three teams in the 4A West region.

On Monday, Northwest used a 15-2 run to build a 51-27 lead with 7:36 remaining in the fourth quarter. With many of the Jaguar starters on the bench, Richard Montgomery (2-16, 1-11) chipped away at the lead. Eight straight points by Rockets guard Paul Sewell sparked a 23-5 run, pulling Richard Montgomery within six. But after a pair of Sewell free throws cut the Northwest lead to 56-50 with 43.3 seconds remaining, the Jaguars scored six of the game’s final eight points to secure the victory.

Northwest head coach Jesse Irvin said several factors might have led to the Jaguars looking past the struggling Rockets.

“When we came out and played Northwest basketball, I think we’re the better basketball team,” Irvin said. “It’s tough that we have a big game tomorrow against Sherwood and we beat [the Rockets] by [16] the first time, and we try to teach them it doesn’t matter … but no matter what, they’re high school kids.”

Northwest senior Brian Duruji scored nine points, including six during the 15-2 run. Three days after putting together what the Irvin and players considered a complete performance against Wootton, Duruji said facing a struggling opponent like Richard Montgomery affected the Jaguars’ intensity level.

“We’ve done this before --- come out lackadaisical,” he said. “That’s why we’ve had these loses.”

Junior guard Thomas Candland scored a team-high 15 points for Northwest, including a trio of 3-pointers. Candland, who scored 13 of the Jaguars’ first 14 points, said he was pleased with how Northwest played.

“I think we played well,” he said. “We knew we had to get them right off the bat. You can’t take any team lightly, regardless of their record. … We ran the court and transition is one of our best things.”

Richard Montgomery led 6-3 early in the first quarter when Candland buried his second 3-pointer, sparking a 15-4 Northwest run. The Jaguars led 18-9 at the end of the first quarter and 31-20 at halftime.

Ramel Davidson scored 11 points and grabbed five rebounds for Northwest. Bruke Fasil scored eight points for the Jaguars, Detrick Hoes finished with six and Bobby Sonken added five.

Sewell led Richard Montgomery with 27 points and Justin Senou added 12.

Northwest will host Sherwood at 7 p.m. on Wednesday

“We’ve got to play Northwest team basketball and sometimes we forget that,” Irvin said. “We have a lot of talent on the team and we tend to go away from the game plan. If they all just buy into it and play together, we are a good team. I’m not going to sit here and say we can beat anybody, but we can be pretty good if everybody buys into it -- but we don’t always have that.”