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Routt Scores 21 in Return As Dragons Stop Knights

Hart wins his first as coach of Cameron

Cameron’s Trey Routt (21) looks to keep the ball away from Tyler Consolidated’s Trent Smith during their game Friday at Cameron High School. The Dragons won, 65-48.

CAMERON — After missing the end of football season and the first game of basketball season with a foot injury, Cameron coach Tom Hart knew Trey Routt was just itching to get into Friday night’s game against Tyler Consolidated.

Hart didn’t start him, making him wait just a tad bit longer.

That likely won’t be the case going forward.

The 6-foot-5 senior scored 21 points in his season debut and the Dragons rolled past the Silver Knights, 65-48, in the home opener at Cameron High School.

“This was his first game back and we talked about it,” Hart said. “We were going to give him a few minutes in the first quarter to see how things went. He had a good week of practice and he really responded.

“That is the thing we want out of our seniors. We rely on Trey and Ben (Hart) for our senior leadership. Trey probably played a few more minutes than we initially anticipated but with our foul trouble, we had to keep him on the floor just a little bit longer. Having him on the floor with those younger players made a difference.”

Routt, who was two rebounds shy of a double-double, did most of his damage in the second half, scoring 16 points in the final 16 minutes as both Cameron and Tyler Consolidated reached the double-bonus in a foul-filled final two quarters.

The teams combined for 63 foul shots, 53 coming after halftime.

With both teams coming off losses in their openers, it wasn’t the pretty game Hart and Tyler Consolidated coach Rob Jones had anticipated.

For Hart, though, it gave him a glimpse of how deep his bench is.

“We had a different level of intensity,” Hart, who earned his first victory as Cameron coach, said. “I think the first game was a bit of nerves, putting in some new schemes and a new system. This one, we focused on what we wanted to do and fine-tune a few things. The boys really responded with what we want.

“Because of the foul trouble, at one point in the fourth quarter, we had two freshmen (Zane Clutter and Garrett Scott) on the floor and they both did well. Those kids that came off the bench did really well and played intense defense. They came in, bent a little bit and didn’t break. Tyler plays a real tenacious defense and it was a good test for our young kids.”

Cameron jumped out to a 10-2 lead to start and never looked back. Despite some strong starts to the second and third quarters, Tyler Consolidated never got closer than six points.

“We came out flat,” Jones said. “The drive to Cameron is always a tough one. I think we were kinda deflated from the Valley game and it was a bump to get over that. We started to pick it up a little. Right now we are trying to get better. The great thing about basketball is everyone is in the playoffs.

“(Cameron got a lot of easy baskets) and that is the price you pay when you try to run a lot of pressure up front. We gave up way too many easy baskets and we constantly talk about help-side, ball-side, but we need to do a better job of getting back.”

Tyler Anderson paced the Silver Knights with 15 points.

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