ETV News Stock Photo Courtesy of Elizabeth Marshall
A week full of late, long bus rides caught up to the Spartans on Friday night. Emery traveled to Vivint Arena on Tuesday and beat Enterprise, stayed to watch the Jazz game and arrived back home well after midnight. Then, on Wednesday, they went down to Blanding and knocked off the Broncos in commanding fashion before another late night of travel. On Friday, they traveled back up north to take on American Leadership Academy (ALA) in what proved to be the toughest test of the week.
A couple Luke Justice fast breaks kept the game close in the early going. Emery came back and tied the game at half, 21-21. After the break, the Eagles went up two possessions heading into the final quarter. For a majority of the season, Emery has used the fourth to put teams away. That was not the case against ALA as tired legs allowed the Eagles to take flight and the game, 60-45.
Justice and Talon Tuttle led the way with 11 points apiece, but overall the shots were not falling for the Spartans. Emery went 15-62 (24%) from the floor and 5-23 (22%) from three. The Spartans were locked in on defense and got their hands on 13 steals, including four from both Justice and Wade Stilson. Meanwhile, Creek Sharp pulled down a team-high eight rebounds. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to overcome poor shooting.
Emery (9-3) will now gear up for region games this week. The Spartans (9-3) will first travel to Richfield (9-3) on Wednesday before hosting Canyon View (9-5) on Friday. The latter game will be streamed live on ETV Channel 10 and online at etvnews.com/livesports.