EDWARDSVILLE – For Belleville West senior forward E.J. Liddell, the Edwardsville defense may have taken him away offensively, but he did contribute in other ways for the Maroons.
Liddell was held to six points in West’s 55-35 win over the Tigers Tuesday night at Lucco-Jackson Gym, as the Maroons broke open a close game and pulled away in the fourth quarter. However, he pulled down 14 rebounds and controlled the boards and was tremendous on the defensive end of the court.
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“Yeah, that’s what we do,” Liddell said in a postgame interview. “They took me away, so all the other guys really had to step up, and I had to step up and be a great passer for my team, and not be a selfish player. But the fourth quarter is always our quarter because we get into the weight room, teams get tired, and that’s what we do. We keep it up.”
The Tigers executed their game plan against the Maroons very well, but West pulled away and put the game away in the final term.
“Our coach (Joe Muniz) said that every team’s going to have their best game against us,” Liddell said, “and we just have to come out and play as hard as possible, and finish the game strong.”
Before the season, Liddell committed to Ohio State in the Big Ten Conference. Since his decision, he’s dedicated himself to be the best player he can possibly be and is fully focused on the game itself.
“I’m focused on basketball,” Liddell said. “This is what I love to do. And recruiting is over with; that’s what I’m happy about. So I just stick to playing basketball, and I’m doing my part in school, also. So it’s a lot of pressure taken off me, knowing where I’m going next year.”
Liddell is looking ahead to the rest of the season, and also has looked back to when the Maroons won the IHSA Class 4A championship last March, winning the final over Chicago Whitney Young in overtime 60-56. It was considered not only a win for the entire Metro-East area, but for all of Southern Illinois as well.
“Well, I was as happy as I could be last year,” Liddell said. “Last year was last year, and I know we’re going to have a big target on our back this year. Everybody’s been playing their hardest, but we’ve got to look forward to this year, and I want to have that same feeling at the end of March, again.”
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