CHOCOWINITY — Washington head coach Steve Flowers was hoping the second annual Southside Holiday Invitational basketball tournament would be a good place for his team to build up its self esteem and that wish came true on Tuesday as the Pam Pack topped Kipp Pride 55-44 to win the tournament title for the second straight season.
While the end of 2011 is near, the basketball season is still in its early stages and Flowers is hoping that going 2-0 in the tourney will propel the Pack to bigger things down the road.
“The big thing is that we defended our crown, but more important than that is that we needed to get on a winning streak,” Flowers said. “We’re on two-game one now and that will build our confidence going into the conference opener when we come back from break.”
Washington (3-4, Coastal Conference) got another good outing by D.J. Bell who scored a team-high 15 points. The Pam Pack also got big games from Keane Graham and Jimmy Williams who scored 11 and seven points, respectively, despite sitting out a large portion of the fourth quarter.
After eight minutes of play Washington took a 16-12 lead into the second quarter, and it was there that the Pam Pack put some distance between itself an the Panthers by outscoring them 15-6 to hold a 31-18 lead at halftime.
“In the second and third quarter we stepped it up defensively and we were able to get some easy buckets,” Flowers said.
Kipp Pride showed a lot of pride as they played hard till the final buzzer and outscored Washington 18-14 in the fourth quarter thanks to an effective press that forced Flowers to put his starters back in the game with under a minute left to play.
Terrance Rogers led the Panthers with a game-high 18 points, eight of which came in the final stanza.

Southside 65, Pamlico 59
Christmas came early for Southside coach Sean White as his team rallied to top Pamlico 65-59 on Tuesday to take third place in the school’s second annual Holliday Invitational tournament.
The Seahawks (4-7, Four Rivers Conference) trailed at the end of each quarter except the fourth where they outscored the Hurricanes 21-12 to head into the holiday break on a happy note.
“It takes a lot of weight off my shoulders and theirs too,” White said. “I told them in the locker room that the best Christmas present we could give each other was a win before the break.”
The Seahawks’ players obliged as they put forth a balanced offensive attack that was led by Rokeem Miller’s 24 points along with Kyle White’s 13 and Bryan Dixon’s 10. Southside also got an eight-point, 11-rebound effort from Byron Murray.
“Kyle stepped up and probably had his best game of the year and Byron has amazed me every game; he’s just getting better and better,” White said.
Southside entered the fourth quarter trailing 47-44 but took a 57-55 lead when Miller stole the ball, drove up court and dished a behind-the-back pass to White for layup to take the lead with 2:37 left to play. Miller would score the team’s next five points to keep the Hurricanes at bay.
Pamlico (3-5, Coastal Plains) was led by backup center Jermichael Brown who scored a team-high 21 points and was a force in the paint. The Hurricanes also got a strong effort from Brad Bennett who tallied 11 points.
Pamlico coach Earl Sadler, whose team fell to Washington on the first day of the tourney, said that Tuesday’s game was just another growing pain for his young team and that he felt the Hurricanes’ performance was an improvement from their loss to the Pam Pack.
“We played much better tonight,” Sadler said. “We lost the first game of the year to West Carteret in what we call ‘winning time,’ the last four minutes of the game and that’s what happened tonight.
“We’re real young. I got two sophomores and a freshman playing a lot of minutes and that’s just how you learn. … It’s just a learning process.”

Game 1
Pamlico    13    18    16    12    —    59
Southside    10    16    18    21    —    65

Hurricanes (59)
Foines 9, Smoak 7, Lewis 5, Dunn 6, Brad Bennett 11, Jermichael Brown 21.
Seahawks (65)
Rokeem Miller 20, Bryan Dixon 11, Rodman 4, Kyle White 12, Rouse 7, Murray 7, Moore 2,

Game 2
Washington    16    15    10    14    —    55
Kipp Pride    12    6    8    18    —    44

Pam Pack (55)
Keane Graham 11, Williams 7, J. Moore 4, D.J. Bell 15, Hayer 4. Green 4, Austin 6, Moore 2, Jackson 2.

Panthers (44)
Evans 4, Terrance Rogers 18, Ingram 7, Glover 4, Rothwell 8, Harris 3.