EDWARDSVILLE - Metro-East Lutheran senior Cameron Gusewelle had a good tournament in the Knights' fourth-place finish in their Thanksgiving Turkey Tip-Off Tournament last week, winning its first two games, before losing in the semifinals to Marquette Catholic and the third-place game to Breese Mater Dei Catholic.
Metro-East fell to Mater Dei 54-17 in the third-place game, in which the Knights showed tremendous resiliency despite being shut out in the first quarter 16-0. Metro-East had great looks at the basket in the quarter, but the shots failed to connect. Metro-East kept playing hard, and were able to get score well in the second quarter, and kept playing hard throughout the entire 32 minutes.
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"Yeah, it's alright, but we've got a lot of room to work," Gusewelle said in a post-game interview following the Mater Dei game. "We can bounce back really well."
The team's work ethic and resiliency will be a trademark for Metro-East in the 2019-20 season, and Gusewelle feels it'll be one of the team's features.
"Oh, yeah," Gusewelle said. "I think one of our best features this season is that we can really run an offense, in that we've got a lot of unselfishness on this team, more than I've ever seen on any team I've played for. And so, we just keep working it and working it, and yeah, first quarter, shots weren't falling, but they'll start falling, and they did in the second, second half. So, it's looking up."
The Knights played without two of their key players, A.J. Smith and DaMarcus Bean, who are both out with injury. Once the both of them come back, Gusewelle feels that once Smith and Bean come back into the lineup, things will be changing for the positive.
"We're missing. like, two of our key players, our bigs, A.J. and DaMarcus," Gusewelle said. "Once we get them back, we'll be a lot better at crashing the boards, and being more physical in the paint, and being able to run our offense with them a little more."
Gusewelle still feels very confident about the new season, and felt that Saturday's game served as a stepping stone towards how the Knights want to play.
"Oh, I definitely am," Gusewelle said. "We've got a lot of stuff going for us right now, and tonight was a big stepping stone, because we were really able to take our time, calm down and run an offense."
As far as personal goals for the season, Gusewelle boiled everything down to two words: Team first.
"I'm really not focused on scoring much, unless the team needs me," Gusewelle said. "Just whatever's best for the team is best, in my opinion."
The Knights will continue to work hard, take things game-by-game, and see where it leads them this coming season.
"That's right," Guswelle said. "Just every day we work, at the end of the day, we've got to be able to say we got better that day."
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