BELLEVILLE – Jaylin Mosby led the way for Belleville West with 13 points, while Lawrence Brazil III added 12, Will Shumpert 11 and E.J. Liddell 10 as the Maroons used early turnovers and a pressure defense to go on to a 59-29 win over Edwardsville in a Southwestern Conference basketball game Friday night at the Belleville West gym.
The Maroons went on a 12-0 run in the first quarter after giving up an opening three-point basket and were never headed.
The Tigers ran into some early difficulty setting up their defense in the quarter-court, and the bad start hurt Edwardsville.
“The start hurt us,” said Tigers coach Dustin Battas. “We didn’t get a chance to set up our quarter-court defense much, and had some turnovers, and guarding them in transition is really, really difficult. They’ve got a lot of good players, and their spacing is good, so, unfortunately, the turnovers, and you get behind, and then you get out to playing a little bit faster and to score faster, which we like to do. But we weren’t able to execute as many things, and a lot of it goes back to us not being able to set our quarter-court defense with those turnovers.”
The 12-0 run the Maroons got off to in the first quarter made a big difference in the game.
“Yeah, the first four or five possessions, we ran some action that we practiced, and had some scoring opportunities,” Battas said, “just lost the ball here and there, missed a shot, and like I said, they got it out down the court quick. But we hung in there for the first few minutes before the turnovers got to us, and they were able to, like I said, get out in transition, and it’s really hard for us to stop it when we can’t get the rim guarded.”
The Tigers kept playing hard throughout the game, which is a trademark of the Edwardsville program.
“Our guys are great,” Battas said. “They practice hard, they want to compete, and they know Belleville West is really good. Our guys were disappointed in the locker room; they felt we would have a chance to win, which is good, a good mindset to have. But they do look forward to practice, and they look forward to competing next week against Gateway (STEM) and East St. Louis.”
Maroon coach Joe Muniz felt the key to the game was the defensive pressure his team put on the Tigers, as well as executing their offense.
“I thought the key to the game was our defensive pressure,” Muniz said. “I felt in our game against them last time, they ran a lot of good offense, and we didn’t guard them as well. And we did a great job in the half-court, just forcing them to play 25, 30 feet from the basket; we turned them over. And then, I thought the other thing we did was executed on the offensive end once we turned them over. We turned them over a lot last time, but we didn’t execute as much. So tonight, I thought we had a great team effort both offensively and defensively.”
Liddell, Brazil and Keith Randolph, Jr. had very good games for West.
“They sure did,” Muniz said. “I thought E.J’s floor game was really good. I mean, he only scored, I don’t know, 10 points, 12 points, whatever he had, but he probably had seven or eight assists. And he doesn’t care what his points are, he just wants to win, and he was very happy with his outcome tonight.”
It was another typical night in the Southwestern Conference, where every game’s a battle, and Muniz paid high compliments to Battas and his team.
“Hey, our conference is really good, and I think Dustin has done an unbelievable job with what he’s got out there,” Muniz said. “Give him and their coaching staff a lot of credit. I just watched them play Alton last Tuesday, and I mean, they played them tough, and it was a good game. So, any win in the Southwestern Conference is a good win.”
The game started out with the Maroons missing their first five shots, while Brennan Weller hit a three for the Tigers to give them the early edge. West then went on their 12-0 run to take the lead, led by Liddell, Brazil, and Mosby to give the Maroons a 12-3 lead before a pair of Jaylon Tuggle free throws broke the string. West outscored Edwardsville 7-2 the remainder of the period, with Liddell hitting a short jumper and a three, while Shumpert dunked before the end of the quarter as the Maroons took a 19-7 lead after one.
West then scored the first five points of the second quarter, using a three-point play by Randolph and a basket from Mosby before Jackson Weller hit a three up top to cut the Maroon lead to 24-10. Tommie Williams and Jalil Roundtree traded baskets before Liddell scored off a steal to make the halftime score 32-12 for the Maroons.
Nic Hemken and Randolph exchanged baskets to open the second half before a three up top from Brazil and baskets from Mosby and Liddell opened up a 41-14 lead for West, causing Edwardsville to call time out. Brazil then scored off a steal, and Malik Robinson hit a three on the side to cut the lead to 43-17. Marcellus Romious countered with his own three, and Robinson hit a shot off the glass to make the score 46-19 West at three-quarter time.
The Maroons then outscored the Tigers 13-10 in the final period, starting with a dunk from Liddell and a basket from Randolph to make the score 50-19. Brennan Weller scored underneath, but Shumpert slammed home a dunk to make it 52-21, triggering the running clock rule. The Tigers outscored West 8-7 for the remainder of the quarter, to make the final 59-29.
Robinson led the Tigers with nine points, while Brennan Weller added seven.
The Maroons, now 20-1 on the season, host Springfield Southeast on Saturday in a 7 p.m. tip-off before playing O’Fallon next Friday night. The postseason is around the corner, and there are some things Muniz would like to see from his club.
“Well, number one, I want to see more defensive efforts like we did tonight,” Muniz said. “We got out and guarded, and did a great job, I think that’s what’s going to propel us down the stretch is our ability to guard people. And then, I think we’ve got to clean up our offense a little bit. Sometimes, we’re too quick to try to get things done, and not patient enough, but overall, pretty good job.”
The Tigers fell to 6-14 on the year and host Gateway STEM of St. Louis on Tuesday night before playing on the road at East St. Louis next Friday in 7:30 p.m. tips. And with the postseason looming, Battas feels that his team is working towards the playoffs.
“I think of Edwardsville, we always focus on the postseason,” Battas said. “We always want to be playing our best basketball with the postseason, so the main thing right now is practice good every day, and our guys know that. We have a lot of new faces, but those guys have been in the program for four years, so they’ve seen how we worked up to the postseason, they’ve seen how we’ve gotten ready for that. We don’t want it to be here yet, we want to enjoy this a little bit longer, but I like where our guys are at, and they are excited about getting ready to play in the postseason.”
Of course, the Tigers work hard in their practice sessions, and it’s another trademark of the team.
“That’s right. These guys come every day to practice ready to work,” Battas said, “and they’ve done a great job preparing to win every game. And in most games, we’ve given ourselves a good chance to do that, and as I said, they really look forward to having the opportunity to compete next week.”
Dan Brannan also contributed to this story.
