Steers pull out comeback win over Millsap to open season

Graham boys head coach Kyle Wood has won plenty of basketball games in his career, but this past Tuesday was his first time as the leader of the Steers.

After spending multiple seasons as the girls head coach, Wood moved over to take the reins of the boys program.

While things may have started out rough, the Steers came from behind to earn a 51-40 win over the Millsap Bulldogs to begin the season.

Graham came out of the gate somewhat sloppy on both sides of the ball as the Steers went down 17-6 after the first quarter and 27-18 at halftime. But the team remained calm and went about its business, shutting down Millsap in the second half to win in come-from-behind fashion.

“I was proud of the way that when things kind of got down, they just were willing to chip away at it and not try to make a home run,” Wood said. “Once we settled down after that first (quarter) I thought we did a good job.”

Millsap got off to a hot shooting start with the Bulldogs knocking down four 3-pointers in the first quarter. Meanwhile, the Steers seemed to be trying to do too much and committed a lot of turnovers which prevented any rhythm.

In addition to the turnovers, most of Graham’s shots were 3-point attempts that the team couldn’t convert. It led to the large deficit after the first quarter of play.

The struggles continued to start the second quarter, and the visitors at one point led 21-6, their biggest lead of the night. Slowly, but surely, however, the Steers began to chip away at the deficit with better passes and more manageable shots.

“I told (my players), ‘They're going to cool off if we can just get up on them,’” Wood said. “Early, we just made it easy; we were closing out late.”

Graham’s offense began to pick up in the second quarter led by Bryce Martin who scored four quick points followed by a transition layup from Cooper Wilde.

Millsap got in foul trouble which led to Graham entering the bonus with four minutes still to play in the frame. Jagger Nees and Wilde combined to go 3-of-4 on free throws before Nees connected on his first 3-pointer of the game to give Graham its halftime point total of 18.

Coming out of the break, Millsap cooled off like Wood had expected and Graham’s defense picked up. In the second half, the Steers outscored the Bulldogs 33-13.

“I thought the second half, we played really good defense, but also thought we rebounded the ball better in the second half of the game,” Wood said.

The Steers finished with 39 rebounds in the game as a team, led by Nikolas Wankowicz who pulled down a team-high 14 rebounds.

Nees got the second half scoring started for Graham with another 3-pointer from the corner. The sophomore finished the game tied with Bryce Martin for the team lead with 16 points each, and 12 of Nees’ 16 points came off of 3-pointers.

Graham took its first lead of the game on a transition layup from Brodie Martin with 3:27 to play in the third quarter to make it 30-29. The two teams tied later at 33-33 before Bryce Martin finished a hard layup with a foul to take a 36-33 lead which the team didn't give up again.

“I was proud of the way that they kind of handled adversity,” Wood said. “We were calm and just slowly over the (final) three quarters we took it.”

Over the last quarter, the Steers kept the pressure on the Bulldogs as Graham entered the bonus again with more than three minutes to play. Multiple players earned trips to the free throw line in the final minutes.

Free throw shooting will be a point of emphasis moving forward, as the team made just 8-of-22 overall. But for a season-opening game with a young squad that’s not even at full strength yet, the win was a positive all around for this team.

“Good first win. We had a lot of gaps and holes to fill with film and (practice),” Wood said. “But I was proud of them, I really was proud of them.”