BELOIT—Beloit Turner boys basketball head coach Ken Watkins wouldn’t go as far to call Tuesday night’s closer-than-expected 77-59 win over Mayville a total wake-up call.
After all, Watkins understands the circumstances: the WIAA Division 3 regional quarterfinal was many of the players first starting playoff experience and the Cardinals had entered the postseason on a three-game winning streak and were much better than their assigned 12th seed let on.
Most importantly, the fifth-seeded Trojans have advanced to Friday’s semifinal against fourth-seeded Edgerton, a matchup that requires no extra get-up from Turner to be ready.
“Our guys won’t need a wake-up call for that,” Watkins said. “That’s the one they’ve been looking forward to. It’s human nature to look ahead a little bit. We're preaching one game at a time, and the kids are saying the same thing, but it's hard not to think ahead.”
Mayville (6-19) gave the Trojan faithful a bit of a scare with its well-rounded offense and pesky defense keeping the Cardinals in it for much of the night.
Turner (19-6) held a 44-33 halftime lead before Mayville, particularly Cohen Raddemann, started burying shot after shot. The Cardinals started the second half on an 18-7 run. Raddemann scored nine of those, including the last two on a steal and layup that tied the game at 51.
“Mayville has some guys that can put the ball in the hole,” Watkins said. “Our help defense wasn’t very good and our ball pressure wasn’t great either. We just continued to let guys drive the middle over and over again.”
Austin Thoreson answered senior Zay Howard’s layup to make it 53-53 halfway through the second half.
“We need to communicate way better on switching on dribble ball screens,” Howard said. “They were just doing dribble drive the whole time. That's an easy switch, which we weren't doing.”
Howard drove down the court and hit a shot at the rim to put Turner back in front and ignite a surge that the Trojans used to pull away.
Howard scored 12 points, mixing in a trey and three-point play, in the 16-2 run that included two booming dunks from seniors Elijah Terrell and Noah Amosa.
“When the ball is in Zay’s hands, good things usually happen,” Watkins said. “He took over on the offensive end and delivered some pretty nice passes and had some really nice finishes to get that lead back up to double digits.”
Howard added that shutting down Mayville’s hot shooters helped feed the offensive success.
“We were getting stops defensively and pushing the ball,” he said. “We were getting on the break and just kept pushing it down their throat.”
Turner came out of the run up 69-55 and the Cardinals couldn’t mount a comeback.
Tyshawn Teague-Johnson was limited to two points in the second half after scoring 13 before halftime. Terrell added 12 points for the Trojans while Mayville was paced by Joren Schlender’s 22 points.
Howard, who finished with 32 points, helped Turner increase a 32-23 lead to a 40-25 advantage in the first half with eight-straight points. But Mayville responded with six points from the free-throw line to cut it to 11 points at halftime.
“Mayville played really hard and they battled,” Watkins said. “They got to the hoop again and again in the second half. Our guys did a really nice job of stepping up and getting some stops. A win’s a win, and it gets us to Friday.”
Turner swept the season series with the Rock Valley Rock Division foe Crimson Tide, who were the conference co-champions with the Trojans.
“We have to stay focused,” Howard said. “We have to pick it up defensively. We have two days of practice to go hard and then right back at it on Friday.”
• BOXSCORE:
BELOIT TURNER 77, MAYVILLE 59
Mayville 33 26 — 59
Turner 44 33 — 77
MAYVILLE (fg ft-fta pts) — Schlender 6 9-9 22, Drinkwine 2 0-0 5, Raddemann 6 0-2 14, Meyer 1 3-4 5, Wiese 1 0-0 2, Thoreson 5 0-0 11. Totals: 21 12-15 59.
TURNER (fg ft-fta pts) — Howard 13 4-7 32, Terrell 6 0-1 12, Teague-Johnson 4 7-8 15, Amosa 4 0-0 8, Dotson 1 0-0 3, Njoo 2 0-0 5, Fernandez 0 2-2 2. Totals:30 13-18 77.
3-pt Goals: Mayville 5 (Raddemann 2, Schlender, Drinkwine, Thoreson), BT 4 (Howard 2, Dotson, Njoo). Fouled out: Raddemann, Hardesty. Total fouls: Mayville 20, BT 17.
Most Popular
Comments / 0