Strong Bond spurs Irmo playoff win over Summerville

It didn’t take Irmo guard Tavonne Bond long to understand this was just going to be one of those nights where everything clicked. The senior guard hit two 3-pointers in the opening minutes to set the tone, as the Yellow Jackets rolled to an 84-56 victory over Summerville Saturday night in the Class 4A boys basketball playoffs.

Bond finished 6-for-8 from long range and scored 28 points to lead three players in double figures.

“When we watched film, we saw they sagged back a lot so we thought we might have a lot of open shots,” Bond said. “Once I made those first two, I knew I was going to be on for the rest of the game.”

Irmo (22-5) finished 13-for-24 beyond the 3-point line. RJ Gunn scored 18 points and hit two 3-pointers and Dre’Von Sweat added 16 points with three 3-pointers.

“Offensively, we’ve been so inconsistent this year,” Irmo coach Tim Whipple said. “There have been games where we have stretches where we shot or played well for a quarter. We did it for four quarters tonight. I’m not sure we can play better offensively then we did a pretty good job defensively as well.”

The win puts the Yellow Jackets into the third round on Tuesday night against Carolina Forest, which defeated James Island 53-49 in overtime. Irmo made it to the third round last year before losing to eventual state champion Sumter.

“We’re hungry,” Bond said. “We know what it’s like to lose in the third round so that makes us want it even more. If we play like we know how we can play, we feel like we can stop anybody.”

Irmo scored the first eight points of the game and never trailed. Bond made his third 3-pointer just before the first quarter buzzer that extended the lead to 20-8. It was never in single digits the rest of the way.

“We knew the guards could shoot 3’s but we had them covered a couple of times and they just elevated over us and shot it,” Summerville coach Greg Elliott said. “They’re very, very skilled and well coached. They don’t make fancy plays, they just make routine plays and hit open jump shots. We didn’t think they would hit a barrage of 13 three-pointers though.”

The fact that Irmo was patient and moved the ball to open man made Whipple pleased.

“Most of the shots we took were pretty good shots,” he said. “We weren’t forcing them up and we showed a lot of patience offensively and that made them play defense and that helped us a lot.”

As impressive as Irmo was on the offensive end, they matched that effort on the defensive end. The Green Wave (21-5) scored 81 points in their first round win and wanted to get out in transition against the Yellow Jackets to beat the 1-3-1 trapping defense Irmo likes to use.

They did a decent job against the press but then couldn’t execute in the half-court. Summerville finished the first half 6-of-16 from the field while Irmo had made seven 3-pointers. The Green Wave didn’t hit a 3-pointer until fourth quarter when the outcome was long decided.

“They score in transition and they did it some against us but we were able to get to have to play in a half-court offense for the majority of the time,” Whipple said.

This story was originally published February 20, 2016 at 9:56 PM with the headline "Strong Bond spurs Irmo playoff win over Summerville."