Harmon gets first win as Horns coach, boys split opening games

First-year Johnson County boys' basketball coach Ethan Harmon matched wits with a couple of dandies while splitting his first two games as the Longhorns' head coach.After opening the season with a 70-62 loss against Providence Academy on Thursday, the Longhorns bounced back to defeat University High, 56-47, in another road game on Friday.Providence Academy is coached by George Pitts, who won three state championships at Science Hill in the 1990s and added four more while at Brentwood Academy the following decade.Pitts coached at King University when Harmon played at Tusculum.University High is led by first-year head coach Steven Hardin, who was previously the Lees-McRae College head coach."We played Lees-McRae when I was at Tusculum, and I know his teams are always coached very well," Harmon said. "He's one of the more respected – as far as accolades go – in the area. That's two really good coaches. I spoke to both of 'em. It was, honestly, an honor to coach against both of those guys."Pitts, who has been a head coach for six decades, saw his Knights jump out to a 22-point lead on the Longhorns."He's still got it," Harmon said with a chuckle. But Harmon was about as pleased to his team rally against Providence as he was to watch it defeat University High."I wanna say we were down 22 at one point," Harmon said. "You know, that's the point at which you can either lay down and get beat by 30 or 40, or keep fighting. Our guys kept fighting. And I think we cut it to, I wanna say, five or six at some point in the fourth quarter…The kids kept the intensity up and closed the gap."Ethan Smith led the Longhorns with 15 points against Providence. Dylan Warren and Landin Lipford added 13 and 11, respectively."Offensively, it's still a work in progress," Harmon said. "We're getting better. I think just from our play day last Saturday (Nov. 15) to our games this week, I think we've progressed on that side. But we've still got a long way to go on that end."Lipford poured in 22 points against University High."He scores at all three levels and he drives it very well," Harmon said.Harmon was pleased with his players' effort and execution with their pressing defense."Every time we put it in the hoop we're up into you," Harmon said. "We sped both teams up. We caused a little havoc both games, which was good."The 'Horns will generally use two five-man units to amplify full-court pressure."It takes all five in unison to pressure 'em and speed the game up in a way that we want to do it," Harmon said. "And I think pretty much one through five in both groups have been impressive on that side. If anything – we may not win every game, but it's going to be exciting to see us just because of how chaotic our style can make everybody."As far as execution goes defensively, I'm proud of every kid on our roster. The effort that we're getting defensively is huge. Every guy's bought into it. They're giving 110 percent. I don't know if I've coached a group that plays as hard as this group does collectively."Realistically, Harmon couldn't have expected much more from his team's first two showings."We've still got a lot of kinks to work out," he said, "but to get a win under us in any fashion early on, especially when you've got guys coming out of football and everything, you've gotta find ways to win games. We found a way to get a tally in the win column."Johnson County boys' basketball is off this Thanksgiving week, and will return to action against Elizabethton on Dec. 2.