Boys Basketball: No. 4 Hillcrest tops Thornton

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Updated: February 10, 2012 8:32AM

Jovan Mooring had the touch going Saturday.

The Hillcrest guard found his shot midway through the first quarter and righted the ship for his team after Thornton jumped out of the gates strong, poised to pull off an upset.

Mooring’s shooting display quelled the purple storm and propelled the No. 4 Hawks to a 68-53 win in Harvey.

“I felt it,” said Mooring, who finished with 25 points. “I let them know once I hit one shot to give me the ball again. And then after I hit another one, keep it coming until I miss.”

Mooring clanked his first six shots, and the Wildcats pounced to a 10-3 lead early on. By the end of the frame, however, he had begun to heat up, netting a 3-pointer and a jumper to spark 12 unanswered points for Hillcrest.

Mooring’s heat check was verified midway through the second quarter when he banked a stop-and-pop step-back shot off the glass from about 20 feet out, using a spin move to dribble himself free. The 6-foot-1 junior swished six consecutive shots during a pivotal stretch in the first half, and from there the rout was on. Mooring finished 8-for-11 from the field after his first quarter shooting woes.

“When (Mooring) gets on fire, he’s fun to watch,” Hillcrest coach Don Houston said. “He caught fire tonight, and that kind of gave us some separation from the other team.”

The Hawks (12-3) used its full-court press to disrupt Thornton’s rhythm, forcing 17 Wildcat turnovers. Desmond Trapp’s breakaway steal and layup put Hillcrest up 29-16 with two minutes, seven seconds left in the second quarter. By halftime, the Hawks were up 14 points, and never thought to look back.

“We did a pretty good job once we picked up the pressure,” Hillcrest coach Don Houston said. “They came out and they jumped on us. But our guys then turned up the pressure on them, and the game turned around.”

Brian Nicholson scored 11 points and was the high man for Thornton, which fell to 5-9.

“I told the kids before we went out there that if we succumbed to the pressure, we were going to have a hard time. And it showed,” Thornton coach Troy Jackson said. “We got pressured, we lost our composure, and were making a lot of ill-advised passes. The result is they were making layups.”