EDWARDSVILLE – The Edwardsville boys basketball team played well again, holding Belleville West standout E.J. Liddell to six points on the night, but Lawrence Brazil III and Jaylin Mosby both scored 13 points each as the defending IHSA Class 4A state champion Maroons pulled away in the final quarter to win over the Tigers 55-35 Tuesday evening at Lucco-Jackson Gym.
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The Tigers executed their game plan very well in holding Liddell, who recently committed to Ohio State in the Big Ten, to six points, especially on back door plays where Liddell could get easy baskets. Liddell did control the boards with 14 rebounds.
“We had a coach with a broom down there all week, and anytime we got a bad cut, we tried to have a Plan B in case E.J. was down there,” said Edwardsville coach Dustin Battas. “That happened. And so, I thought our guys did a great job in reading that, and help was there, and that helped a lot, just getting a couple of open looks in the corner down there. But once again, them paying attention in practice, knowing where our strengths and weaknesses are, and them being able to carry out the things we practiced gave us a chance.”
Liddell is indeed a great player, and what most people may not realize about him is that he plays hard for the entire 32 minutes of the game and making other contributions to his team’s success.
“E.J.’s such a presence; I know he only had six points, but he’s terrific on defense,” Battas said. “I think people don’t realize how hard he plays, too. E.J’s a great, skilled player, but he has a great motor, and Joe (Muniz, the Maroons’ head coach) does a great job in putting him in great spots that make him hard to guard. So I am very proud of our guys. Brennan Weller, holding him to six points is outstanding, and our help defense was good. The thing I’m most proud of is the ability to execute our game plan. You know, you can practice all that. But when Belleville West actually shows up, and E.J. Liddell comes walking out there, can you really carry it out? And our guys did an incredible job of carrying out our game plan and staying with it, and just kept working and kept working. So, because of the practice, because of the attention to detail, and the hard work, we gave ourselves a chance, which is what you ask for as a coach.”
Muniz gave great credit to the Tigers for executing their game plan.
“Give Dustin and his team all the credit in the world; they had a good game plan,” Muniz said. “We weren’t necessarily great tonight, they did some things that we hadn’t seen. But with that being said, we came out with a 20-point victory. It’s always tough to win on the road, especially here, and I thought our guys really buckled down in the fourth quarter; I don’t know what they ended up scoring in the fourth, seven points, and got some separation there.”
And although Liddell was held in check most of the night, both Brazil and Mosby picked up the slack very well.
“We’ve got plenty of scorers out there,” Muniz said. “We shot a lot of threes to start the game. We can shoot them, but we didn’t make them at the beginning. Jaylin made a couple of big threes, got to the basket a couple of times. They were putting three, four guys on E.J., making the other guys step up and score, and they all can do it. We can put five guys, six guys, seven guys that can get double figures every night. We just got to do a better job of executing that. And like I said, we haven’t seen that all season, and you could do all the practicing and preparing you want, but Edwardsville does a good job running their stuff, and getting you to do things differently, and they’re used to playing that way. Most schools aren’t used to playing that way. They are, and we just need to a better job compromising their defense to where we’re getting to the basket like we did in the fourth quarter. I though we shot lay ups in the fourth quarter.”
Mosby scored the game’s first five points on a lay up from a great pass from Liddell and a three from the side, before a Nic Hemken lay-in gave the Tigers its first points. After the Maroons made it 7-2, Edwardsville got baskets from Malik Robinson and Hemken before Robinson found an open lane and drove in to score to give the Tigers its first lead at 8-7. A three-point play from Tommie Williams gave West the lead back, and Liddell leaped over everyone off a rebound to score and give the Maroons a 12-8 lead at quarter time.
A Keith Randolph, Jr. basket extended the lead to six early in the second, but a three from Grant Schaefer and a steal and score from Lavontas Hairston cut the lead to 14-13, which it where it stayed for much of the quarter, with both teams missing close-in shots. A three from Hairston gave Edwardsville the lead, but Mosby, Marcellus Romious and Liddell all scored before the buzzer to give West a 20-16 lead at halftime.
The Maroons went on a 9-3 run at the start of the second half, with Mosby hitting a three and Brazil scoring on a lay in, and later Will Shumpert and Brazil scoring to make it 29-19. With about five minutes left in the period, Keith Randolph, Jr. was called for a personal foul, and then a technical foul. Weller hit both free throws on the technical, and it sparked a 6-1 Tiger run to cut the lead to four at 30-26, but the Maroons were able to recover and score the quarter’s last four points to make it 34-26 after three.
Weller hit on a lay up and Hairston hit a three, with Mosby hitting on a three in between, to make the score 37-31 at the start of the final term, but the Maroons scored the next five points on a Randolph steal and score, along with a free throw, and a driving dunk from Liddell to make it 42-31. West then outscored the Tigers 13-4 the rest of the way, with the Maroons going seven of ten from the line late to make the final of 55-35.
Hairston was the only Tiger in double figures with 10 on the night, followed by Robinson, with seven.
The Maroons used their defense to create turnovers that led to the baskets in the fourth quarter, wearing the Tigers down.
‘I think the biggest thing is we can wear teams out physically,” Muniz said. “We’re strong and athletic, they kind of wore out, they turned the ball over a little bit more, but I’ll be honest. I’ve seen Edwardsville play two or three times this year. I don’t think I’ve seen them handle the ball that well, today. They shot the ball well, and you expect that coming up here that they would do that. So credit to them.”
And individually, the Tigers had some good games as well.
“Malik was outstanding against their press, and Malik’s outstanding on defense,” Battas said. “And I thought we did a good job of making baskets when we had opportunities. A couple of times, they trapped, and Nic would do a great job of passing it to the open man out of the trap, and Schaefer, same thing, great passer, and Brennan made some shots around the basket, even with (Liddell) in there. So our guys, I thought, individually, had some great moments, and together as a team, really executed things well to give ourselves a chance. I’m very proud of the guys.”
The Tigers love to compete, and look forward to playing against the Maroons again in Belleville later in the season. But right now, it’s first things first.
“Our guys like to compete, and we’re looking forward to Granite City on Friday," Coach Battas said. "Our guys like practicing. We are not down; I know that people look at our box scores sometimes and see we’ve lost a game or two in a row. Our guys are tough, and our guys like each other, and they like to practice, so we’re going to keep working, and we are committed to getting better every day, so good things will happen when you do we are that.”
And it was just another night at the office in the Southwestern Conference, where every game is a battle, and good players and coaches are everywhere.
“There are no nights off in our conference, you know that. Everybody’s good,” Battas said. “So we’re just going to keep getting bette and keep working on improving. I like where our team will be in two to three weeks, hopefully. There are no cupcakes in the Southwestern Conference, and we know that. And I think also, people don’t realize that, great coaches in the Southwestern Conference. Everyone talks about the players, but tremendous coaches in our league. You’re not going to have a night in our conference where the other team doesn’t know everything about you, and they have their own game plan, they have their own strategies. Very competitive league.”
Muniz agreed with Battas about the competition in the conference. The Maroons have played in shootouts around the region, most recently in Kentucky, and playing in the league is a totally different experience.
“It’s totally different,” Muniz said. “Not to take away from anybody we’ve played, but this conference is the best in the state. I firmly believe it; the coaches in here are some of the best in the state, and I firmly believe that. They don’t roll the balls out and just play. I told our kids after our last game at Marshall County, I said ‘hey, we’re rolling in the Southwestern Conference’, and these guys are going to game plan against us, and they’re going to coach their kids up, and they’re going to play a different way that what we’ve seen, where most teams are just going to try to match up with you and go man to man, and we’re pretty good if they do that. I thought in the conference, you’re going to find coaches that are going to scheme you and challenge you, and tonight, we met the challenge.”
Although the Tigers lost, there’s still plenty to be proud of.
“Just really proud of our guys,” Battas said. We are disappointed a little that we lost, but not discouraged.”
Belleville West improves to 8-0 overall and 2-0 in the Southwestern Conference, while Edwardsville falls to 2-4 overall and 0-3 in the SWC. Edwardsville plays Friday at home against Granite City. Belleville West travels to East St. Louis for another key game.
Dan Brannan also contributed to this story.
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