“What people fail to realize is we don’t get the normal efforts from teams coming in here. They understand they’re playing Potomac, and so we get their best shot.”
–Potomac coach Keith Honore
Freedom-Woodbridge certainly came into its game with the #1 Panthers ready to play. After going down 5-0 early, the #15 Eagles unleashed a barrage of threes on Potomac, taking a 23-14 lead. The visitors scored 25 points after the first quarter and led by four points over the Panthers, thanks to 15 points from their bench.
But then it was time for Potomac’s counter-punch, led by one Nana Opoku.
Opoku, a 6’8″ senior headed for Mount St. Mary’s in the Fall, gave the Panthers to best game of his career to lead his team to a 90-76 victory. He scored 32 points on an unbelievable 13 of 14 shooting performance, absolutely dominating the guard-oriented Eagles down low. And while he couldn’t do much about Freedom’s hot shooting on the perimeter, he made sure they would live and eventually die out there. Opoku ripped down 11 rebounds and came away with 10 blocks. That’s a triple-double, folks.
The humble center couldn’t help but smile after the game as he snacked on some victory pizza. When asked if this was the best game he’s ever played, he was quite sure it was. “It has to be,” he said. “I’ve never had a triple-double before.”
It wasn’t any coincidence Freedom built its nine-point lead partially with Opoku getting a rest on the bench. When the Panthers trailed early they didn’t lose their composure. Instead, Honore made a concerted effort to get the ball inside to Opoku. The strategy worked.
“We think that’s our strength,” Coach Honore said after the game. “We think we have a multitude of guys who can do it [score down low]–obviously Nana is very, very good at it–and we felt like we needed to go into the post and go to the paint. Give our kids credit, they did a very good job of it.”
Potomac opened the second quarter with a beautiful sideline inbounds play pass from Devon McDonald to Byron Scriber for a backdoor lay-up. From there the Panthers kept the pressure on, getting the ball inside to Opoku and re-taking the lead. Freedom continued to stay close, however, mainly through its proficient three-point shooting. The Eagles hit 12 on the night and although they couldn’t match their red-hot first quarter shooting, they only trailed by five, 44-39, at the break.
In the second half Potomac continued to score at the rim, opening up a double-digit lead in the third quarter. Potomac ran the court off Opoku’s rejections, and also drew a ton of charges when the Eagles drove the lane. On offense when they missed Opoku was often there to follow up with a basket off an offensive rebound. His “and-one” follow put the Panthers up 66-54 late in the third after Freedom had cut the lead back to single digits. In the fourth he brought the packed house to its feet with a dunk off a missed shot to make it 72-57. The Eagles lost some composure, and couldn’t keep up.
“I was a little bit upset in the second half,” Freedom coach James West said. “The one thing we pride ourselves with doing at Freedom is sticking to our system. In the second we kind of got out of character. We lost a little composure. Had chances to go up here and there but simple mistakes–panicking, rushing shots–hurt us. We started forcing shots instead of running our system.”
Even if the Eagles (8-6) had made more shots, it might not have been enough against Potomac (13-1) on this night. As good a game as Opoku had, Potomac guard Jamal Washington was almost as fantastic. He scored 31 points and pulled down eight rebounds and was virtually unstoppable at times. What was perhaps most impressive was Opoku and Washington combined to go 15 of 15 from the line. As a team the Panthers shot 22 of 24 from the charity stripe–a sobering statistic for anyone that wants to win a close game against Potomac this year.
Joining Opoku at Mount St. Mary’s next year will be Freedom guard James West IV. West scored 20 points for the Eagles as did reserve junior guard Dominic Braswell. Braswell was incredibly efficient, getting his 20 on eight-of-nine shooting from the field and four three-pointers. It just wasn’t enough against Potomac’s best counter-punch, however–Opoku from the left, Washington from the right.
“How many teams make eight threes in the first half?” Honore said, referring to Freedom. We get everybody’s best shot, it seems. They shot well, our kids weathered the storm, and it’s not that we’re starting slow, it’s just that teams are playing really hard and really well against us early on.”
“But that championship behavior came through and we weathered the storm and punched back and took over there towards the end.”
–Chris Jollay
all stats are unofficial
| POTOMAC | FG | FT | TP | RB | AST | |
| MCDONALD | 4-10 | 0-0 | 10 | 3 | 4 | |
| CAMP | 2-9 | 4-4 | 8 | 4 | 6 | |
| WASHINGTON | 10-21 | 9-9 | 31 | 8 | 3 | |
| SCRIBER | 3-7 | 2-2 | 8 | 6 | 0 | |
| OPOKU | 13-14 | 6-6 | 32 | 11 | 1 | |
| White | 0-0 | 1-3 | 1 | 1 | 0 | |
| Williams | 0-1 | 0-0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | |
| TOTALS | 32-62 | 22-24 | 90 | 34 | 14 | |
| Three Pointers: McDonald 2-4, Washington 2-4, Camp 0-1, Williams 0-1 | ||||||
| FREEDOM | FG | FT | TP | RB | AST | |
| BROWN | 2-8 | 0-2 | 5 | 6 | 5 | |
| WEST IV | 7-18 | 3-3 | 20 | 2 | 6 | |
| MATTHEWS | 1-1 | 3-3 | 6 | 1 | 0 | |
| PEACOCK | 2-5 | 0-0 | 6 | 0 | 0 | |
| NUNNALLY | 5-7 | 1-4 | 11 | 6 | 1 | |
| Braswell | 8-9 | 0-0 | 20 | 1 | 0 | |
| Hicks | 0-1 | 0-0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | |
| Simms | 3-5 | 1-3 | 8 | 2 | 0 | |
| Lee | 0-1 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Booth | 0-3 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| TOTALS | 28-58 | 8-15 | 76 | 19 | 12 | |
| Three Pointers: West IV 3-13, Braswell 4-4, Peacock 2-2, Matthews 1-1, Simms 1-1, Brown 1-3, Lee 0-1 | ||||||