Staff Report

PATTERSON — Entering this season, the Patterson coaches knew they had to replace an experienced group of players from last season that went undefeated in District 9-3A play and made the quarterfinals.

They also knew they had a talented freshman class coming.

On Monday night, the group, including those freshmen, put an exclamation on a second undefeated District 9-3A season with an 85-24 victory against Erath, capping their second consecutive 12-0 mark in league play.

Patterson coach Ryan Taylor said nothing his team, which includes freshmen Nehemiah Augustus and Mykel Jones in the lineup and freshmen DJ Jones and Taylon Grogan coming off the bench, shocks him.

“I knew we had a good chance to if we got the breaks to go our way. … When you go to teams and you play on the road with young teams, it takes you a little while to get in the flow. … As the season progressed, we got better …” he said.

The ’Jacks (16-6 overall), who earned most of their victories this season in district play after getting a late start to the season, were learning on the fly this year.

“The one thing I knew coming in that if we could just get a little confidence in ourselves, we would be fine,” Taylor said. “As this season’s gone, we’ve shot the ball so much better. Nehemiah’s turning it on now. He’s shooting the ball … like we expected him to shoot. Mykel’s getting in a flow.”

Deondre Skinner, one of two seniors on this year’s squad along with Denzel Johnson, said this year’s district championship is more meaningful than last year’s because he knew this year would be more of a challenge as the squad had to replace pieces from last year’s squad.

“In practice, me and Denzel coached and talked to our lower classmen pretty hard and told (them) what to do, like right from wrong,” Skinner said. “After that we just carried on to the season and played really good. So everybody stepped up. Young (men) stepped up and got us a district championship.”

In Monday’s contest, Patterson raced out to a 23-6 lead after a period of play and took a 40-15 lead in the half.

Patterson had its best quarter defensively in the third period as it held Erath to two points, while the ’Jacks scored 20 points.

In the fourth, Patterson outscored Erath 24-8.

Taylan Grogan was one of four ’Jacks in double figures as he scored 12 points, Dontrell Benjamin added 11 and Denzel Johnson and Mykel Jones had 10 each in the victory.

Other top contributors included Deondre Skinner and Kenneth Washington with eight apiece; Larry Turner, seven; Augustus, six; Daylon Charlot, 5; and DJ Jones, four.

Central Catholic defeats VC

The Central Catholic Eagles defeated Vermilion Catholic 85-41 in both teams’ District 8-1A finale Monday in Morgan City.

The win capped an undefeated district season for Central Catholic, who finished league play 8-0.

No individual stats were available from the contest.

Central Catholic will return to action Wednesday when it hosts Loreauville in non-district play. Boys’ varsity action is set for a 6 p.m. start.

Morgan City falls

to Assumption

In Monday’s recap of the weekend action, the scorers for Morgan City in its 39-34 loss were omitted.

Jaylen Jones led Morgan City (13-13 overall, 2-6 in District 8-4A) with 16 points, while Eric Walker added six points; Brannon Randle, five; Taylor Brocato, four; and Marquis Green, three.