By JEREMY HALL

jeremy.hall@register-news.com

HERRIN — It took an additional eight minutes, but Mt. Vernon got off its season-opening schnide at the Pyramid Plus Tournament at Herrin on Tuesday.

The Rams, who fell 57-38 to Massac County on Monday, sagged to an early 10-3 deficit against host Herrin on Tuesday and trailed 14-7 at the end of the first quarter before rallying in a big way and eventually winning 55-44.

The Tigers made five of their first seven field goals from within two feet of the basket in staking the first-quarter lead. From there, however, the Rams used a 12-4 run to claim a 19-18 halftime lead from which they never looked back.

“I’m very proud of how our guys responded, especially after the first quarter,” said Mt. Vernon (1-1) coach Scott Gamber. “Our guys could have easily packed it in and thought, ‘here it goes again.’ I really thought we got it going.”

The Rams appeared the slumbering giant against the Tigers early, with Herrin pounding the ball inside and stretching a 2-1 lead to 6-1 and eventually 10-3 and 12-5. Mt. Vernon made just one of its first five shot attempts in the game and was shooting 3 for 8 from the field at the end of the first quarter.

But the Rams pushed the ball further from the basket at the defensive end in the second period and Herrin eventually went eight minutes, 17 seconds between field goals at one point in the second half.

During that span, Mt. Vernon opened up a 19-point lead early in the fourth quarter.

“It was hard boxing out,” said Mt. Vernon senior Logan Murphy. “But once we figured that out, success came. Once we boxed out and got rebounds we got a 19-point lead.”

A field goal and a free throw by Kellin Edwards closed Mt. Vernon ‘s early deficit to 16-14 midway through the second quarter. Tyril Trimble scored inside and Cameron Tucker stuck back a Dorvontous Gordon miss as the Rams knotted the score at 18 apiece with one minute, 12 seconds left in the first half.

Gordon made one of two free throws with 4.5 seconds left on the clock to give Mt. Vernon its first lead of the game, 19-18.

Herrin was allowed just one rebound in the third quarter while Mt. Vernon stretched its lead to double digits. The Tigers scored made their first field goal of the second half at the 3:10 mark of the third quarter, missing six baskets and turning the ball over five times during an eight-plus minute drought without a basket.

“We played hard,” said Murphy. “But we’ve still got a few things to work on.”

Trimble paced the Rams with 12 points while Kevon Fortney came off the bench to add 11 points and six rebounds.

Herrin’s David Morrow led all scorers in the game with 16 points, while teammate DeMario Harris added 14. Alex Brown, the Tigers’ 6-foot-9 dunking machine a night earlier, was limited to eight points on 4-of-10 shooting from the field. Brown did manage eight rebounds to lead all players in that category.

“We wanted to rotate on him,” said Gamber, “to push him out on the floor as much as we could, be physical with him and make him earn his points. I thought we did a good job with that.”

The Rams continue Pyramid Plus Tournament play 5:30 p.m. today against Memphis River City.



At Herrin

Mt. Vernon 7 12 21 15 - 55

Herrin 14 4 13 13

MT. VERNON: Kellin Edwards 3-6 2-6 8, Logan Murphy 2-4 1-2 6, Ashtun Rush 3-3 0-1 6, Ian Randolph 1-3 1-4 3, Tyril Trimble 3-9 5-7 12, Cameron Tucker 3-6 0-2 6, Dorvontous Gordon 1-3 1-4 3, Kevon Fortney 5-12 0-0 11. TOTALS: 21-46 10-26 55.

HERRIN: Alex Brown 4-10 0-2 8, David Mallow 7-11 2-4 16, DeMario Harris 7-12 0-0 14, Jamie Jones 0-3 0-0 0, JoJo Hart 1-7 0-0 3, Nikki Timmons 1-2 0-0 2, Jake Caldwell 0-0 1-2 1, Jason Hart 0-4 0-0 0. TOTALS: 20-49 3-8 44.