BY DAVID FOLSE II

Sports Editor

EDGARD-It was one of their closet games of recent note.

The funny thing is that they still won by 18 points.

Behind yet another new leading scorer in Tyren Johnson, the West St. John Rams picked up a first-round playoff victory last Friday night against Jewel Sumner, 62-44.

The Rams advanced to a second round matchup on the road against North Central last night.

An unusually close game for the Rams until late in the game, West St. John outscored Jewel Sumner 23-16 in the final quarter to come away with the victory.

Johnson led the Rams with 15 points. Denarold Anderson added 13 points and Dehaven Butler had 12 points.

“We started off playing a little sluggish,” Rams Head Coach Antoine Edwards said. “We would turn the ball over and they would turn the ball over. It was a very sloppy start.

“However, when we had to come up big and make the run that we had to be able make to come away with the victory, our kids really stepped up.”

As had been the case all season, Edwards said his team won thanks in large part to their defensive effort.

“When we had to clamp down on defense and get stops we were able to do that,” Edwards said. “We shut them down when we had to.”

A young team, Edwards said he could sense a bit of nervousness at the start.

“Without a doubt,” Edwards said. “You could tell that by how sluggish of a start that we got off to. We missed a lot of easy baskets early that should have been scores. We recovered though and came out on top. That is what good teams do and we did it when it mattered the most.”