By Mike London
mlondon@salisburypost.com
MISENHEIMER ó Twenty-four hours after an ugly loss to Cheyney State, host Pfeiffer salvaged the third-place game in the Highway 52 Shootout by beating Livingstone 99-87.
The first half precisely followed the blueprint Pfeiffer coach Dave Davis prefers. Pfeiffer (1-1) forced turnovers, buried 3-pointers and made a taller Livingstone team look very uncomfortable playing helter-skelter.When Livingstone coach James Stinson stared up at the scoreboard after 14 minutes of general mayhem, he read unpleasant news: Falcons 37, Visitors 14.
It wasn’t over, but it was close to over.
“We didn’t have that same fire and intensity tonight we had Saturday,” Livingstone coach James Stinson said. “Pfeiffer ran their dribble-draw-and-kick and worked it to perfection. They just stunned us.”
Chris Woods, who represented Pfeiffer on the all-tournament team, threw down a fastbreak dunk late in the first half, and the Falcons led 55-32 at the break.
“We played better in the second half, but that’s too big a hole,” Stinson said.
Woods, a 6-foot-6 postman, led the Falcons, who shot 44 free throws, with 23 points. Guard Jeff Pettiway hit four first-half 3s, was 8-for-8 from the line and scored 22.
“I tip my hat to Livingstone because that’s a tremendous group of athletes from tallest to smallest,” Woods said. “But we were ready to play. We all felt like we let each other down Sunday and our main thing is accountability. Tonight, we were accountable.”
Livingstone (0-2) got a stylish reverse dunk from Greg Henry for two of the 55 points it scored after the break. Henry scored 23 points. Jarred Stockton had 21.
The Blue Bears fought within 89-78 with 2:52 remaining, but Woods and James Crowder made plays on two straight textbook pressbreaks that were backbreakers.
“It was a great bounce-back effort for us,” Davis said. “We rebounded tremendously.”
LIVINGSTONE (84) ó Henry 23, Stockton 21, Caruthers 16, Cannon 5, Wilson 5, Durant 5, Freeman 4, Darden 3, Kimber 2, Ford, Shields, Taylor, Zapata, Johnson.
PFEIFFER (99) ó Woods 23, Pettiway 22, Crowder 13, Jordan 10, Truesdale 8, Carr 7, Yamaguchi 6, Morse 6, Eaford 4, Gilliard, Rivera.
Livingstone 32 55 ó 87
Pfeiffer 55 44 ó 99