Statesmen Finish Regular Season Strong

By Bryant Marks
HUDSON, NC — Richard Bland College men's basketball finishes their regular season tonight after a tough contest against Caldwell Community College & Technical Institute, 94-81.

Finishing the regular season with a 14-14 record, RBC improves their record by 8 wins over last season.  Now in playoff mode, the team will play #4 seed Brunswick Community College as the #5 seed in the first round of the Region X Conference Tournament. The tournament will take place next week from March 5-7.

The game on Friday saw the Statesmen match up against nationally- ranked Caldwell Community College for the second time this season. Starting the game off hot, Caldwell rolled from the opening whistle, going on a 22-4 run. Running a bigger lineup, RBC swapped in their own bigger lineup to match the Cobras front court. The bigger lineup cut Caldwell's lead down to 11 but the Statesmen trailed by double-digits going into halftime. Caldwell continued with what was working in the first into the second half. Richard Bland made runs throughout the second half but none amounted to anything significant on the scoreboard despite the hard-working effort. The final buzzer sounded with a final score of 94-81 as Caldwell beat the Statesmen. 

Finishing the game with a season high in points, Savion Helm scored 25 points for the Statesmen tonight. Kenneth Southerland finished with 15 and Terry Gray Jr. and Derrick Redmon both had 11 points as well.