The Putnam County boy’s basketball team is one of the premiere Class 2A programs in the state of Georgia, and they have been proving that point with recent performances.
The War Eagles played three games last week and came out on top in each of them.
Head coach LaPatrick Marshall told The Eatonton Messenger that it was good to finally see his guys play up to their full potential for all four quarters.
“I gave my guys a test and told them that if we’re a ranked team, we need to play like it. When we played Westside, I feel like we didn’t play to where our capabilities are,” Marshall said. “I gave them the challenge of playing a good team, and if we’re that good, then we should be able to compete against a good team, and they accepted the challenge and played well.”
They started the week off last Tuesday taking on the Thomson Bulldogs – another top-five team in Class 2A. Putnam County defeated its region opponent 70-65 in a hard-fought matchup with junior Landon Bonner and senior Eren Banks leading the team on the offensive end.
Bonner led the War Eagles with 24 points in that contest while Banks contributed 23. Fellow senior Keyni Crawford also added to Putnam’s total with 11 points of his own.
The top-10 matchup was important for Marshall’s squad because not only was it a staple win for the program, but it also moved them ahead of a region opponent competing for better seeding come tournament time at the end of the season.
Next, the War Eagles traveled to Glenn Hills to play the Spartans in another region game.
Putnam County was able to get off to a quick start and not look back as the War Eagles throttled the Spartans 93-43 for their 13th win of the season. Bonner led the team with 32 points in that contest while Crawford added 17 and Cameron Stephen added 10.
Over the course of its win streak, the team has relied on role players to pick up the slack when others aren’t playing to their potential, and no one has been better about that than Payton Ellison.
The 6-foot-3 small forward has been playing valuable minutes for this War Eagles squad as of late, and Marshall acknowledged that his energy is important for the other guys’ morale and success.
“[Ellison] is definitely the energy guy. Other teams have so much to account for when preparing for him because of all the little things that he does,” Marshall said. “He plays the small forward position really hard and is a mismatch for a lot of people. These last couple of games, Payton has really been playing up to the potential I thought he had at the beginning of the season.”
To end the team’s three-game stretch, Putnam County traveled to Jasper County this past Saturday to take on the Hurricanes.
It was the most exciting game of the three as the War Eagles found themselves in a dogfight until the end of regulation. After having to go to overtime, Putnam County found a way to win the game and defeated Jasper County 63-61 to end a perfect week.
Banks was back in the lineup for the rivalry game and ended with 33 points on the night. Bonner added 14 points while Ellison added 10, with the three combining for all but nine of the War Eagles’ points.
The win improved the team to 14-3 on the season with a 5-1 record in Region 4A.
Down the stretch, Marshall just hopes that his guys will maintain the same amount of focus that they are practicing and playing with now until the end of the season.
“We’ve got to stay focused on these games and can’t start looking ahead and thinking about the playoffs, because that’s when you slip up,” Marshall said. “Right now, my main thing is just to keep playing our basketball. The community is behind us, and sometimes it’s hard to handle success, so as we find more and more of it, I hope we can stay focused. Up to this point, I feel like the guys have done a good job of that and not letting it weigh on them too much.”
Looking ahead, the rest of Putnam County’s schedule will be played against other region opponents, with tough schools like Westside, Butler and Thomson all still to come.
However, the War Eagles have already experienced big moments this season and will be more prepared down the road.