By BRIAN WOODSON
Bluefield Daily Telegraph
BLUEFIELD, Va. — It had been more than a decade since Glynn Carlock Jr. had seen his Detroit Lions in the NFL playoffs.
His opportunity to see them on Saturday night was delayed, but it was worth the wait, as the G-Men defeated Richlands 69-64 at Graham Middle School to snap a six-game losing streak.
Graham (4-6), which opened the season with three straight wins, ran into a difficult schedule, but have beaten the Blue Tornado twice, winning at Richlands 72-56 in early December.
“We have been fighting hard to get another win, it has been a long month,” Carlock said. “We have played some super quality teams during this month in the span of Bluefield, Radford, Galax, all contending teams.
“It has been a little bit demoralizing to a group that is fairly young and it has taken them a couple of weeks to try to get out of that funk to get to the level of play that we need to be at.”
While Graham snapped a six-game skid, Richladnds (1-7) saw its losing streak extended to six games.
“I was proud of the kids, we battled,” said Richlands first-year head coach Jody Fuller. “We have had some setbacks here lately, I thought we were coming a little better than we were.
“We had a game last night with Abingdon where we just did not perform, but I have been seeing signs of improvement.”
Graham was led by freshman Tony Hood, who scored 21 points, including five 3s, two of which came in the fourth quarter that enabled the G-Men to tie the score at 55-55, and then take the lead at 60-58 before the Blues managed to tie it on a basket by Devon Johnson with 1:40 to go.
“I thought Tony Hood played a real big game for us, he played really , really well,” Carlock said. “He had four steals, he handled the ball well for us tonight.”
Free throws down the stretch proved to be the difference for Graham, which made 9-11, led by Lamont Edwards, who made five of them. Hood also had two, as did Zach Proffitt.
Richlands pulled within 64-62 on a Devon Johnson drive to the hoop, but the G-Men outscored the Blues 5-2 from that point.
Graham was 23-35 from the free throw line in the game, while Richlands was 16-28.
“Late in the game there I thought Gabe Hurt and Lamont came in and gave us some really good defense,” Carlock said. “They were able to frustrate them enough to get us out of here with a win tonight.”
Richlands was paced by Devon Johnson with 26 points, but the standout football player who has committed to Marshall, hit just 6-15 from the free throw line. Ben Brown added 17 points, including 10-13 from the charity stripe.
Stopping Johnson proved to be a chore, but he missed some of the first half with foul trouble. Richlands lost three players to fouls in the final period.
“I thought we decided to play some defense, especially late in the game,” Carlock said. “We did not do a very good job early in the game defending Johnson or defending them as a whole.
“Our press bothered them a little bit, but it really wasn’t enough to cause enough disruptions that we wanted to have. A lot of the team’s credit goes to our late defense tonight, and we hit some free throws late which was nice to try and extend it out a little bit.”
Spencer Sheets and Gray Baker added eight points each for Graham, while Proffitt and Tyler Thompson had six apiece. Thompson also pulled down five rebounds.
Richlands, whose lone win was a two-point decision against Mountain Mission early last month, also received 10 points from Gabe Hunsaker.
The Blue Tornado, which trailed 31-30 at the break, is slated to play Tazewell, Grundy and Lebanon in the week ahead.
Fuller, whose Blues had four 3s, including two by former Bluefield Beavers’ product D.J. Flack, expects his squad to continue to improve.
“I told them to let this make them hungry and not be satisfied with losing by five, but make them want to go over the top with them,” said Fuller, whose Blue Tornado lost by 16 in the previous meeting. “This is what I have been seeing, I think we closed quite a bit on Graham tonight, I think our kids are starting to come a little bit.”
Graham will host Tazewell on Wednesday, and have Mountain Empire District games this week with Narrows and Bland County.
“I am just glad to get a win, the kids are glad to get a win,” Carlock said. “We’ve got a big three-game week next week. All in all, it was a nice effort tonight.”
—Contact Brian Woodson
at bwoodson@bdtonline.com

at Graham Middle School
RICHLANDS (1-7)
A.Johnson 0 0-0 0, Harris 1 0-0 3, Ben Brown 3 10-13 17, Devon Johnson 10 6-15 26, Gabe Hunsaker 5 0-0 10, Barnette 1 0-0 2, Z.Johnson 0 0-0 0, Deel 0 0-0 0, Flack 2 0-0 6. Totals 22 16-28 64.
GRAHAM (4-6)
Tony Hood 6 4-6 21, Sheets 3 2-3 8, Baker 2 3-4 8, Proffitt 2 2-2 6, Coppola 1 1-4 3, Hurt 1 2-4 4, Yost 1 0-0 2, Hill 2 0-0 4, Edwards 0 5-8 5, Thompson 2 2-2 6, Day 0 2-2 2. Totals 20 23-35 69.
Richlands...........................14 16 15 19 — 64
Graham...............................17 14 17 21 — 69
3-point goals: RL 4 (Flack 2, Harris 1, Brown 1); GR 6 (Hood 5, Baker 1). Total fouls: 24; GR 23. Fouled out: A.Johnson, Harris, Flack. JV—GR 46-41.