Roper powers St. Mary’s past Grand Blanc, 65-52
When Orchard Lake St. Mary’s coach Todd Covert prepares his opening statement to the jury of his peers at the end of the season, making the case for Julius Roper II as Mr. Basketball, it’ll be nights like Wednesday that he points at.
Playing against another top-10 team in Grand Blanc, and matched up individually against a top-50 player in the nation like Ty Rodgers, it was Roper who took over the game in the second half, scoring 14 of his game-high 29 points in the fourth quarter alone, as OLSM rolled to a 65-52 win.
“I’m going to say one thing: I just hope the people voting for Mr. Basketball realize our schedule. We play seven teams in the top 15. I’m going to bang on anybody, but to go out and play … Abilene Christian and Parkway, and whoever, and put up huge numbers … you know?” Covert said of the Northwestern-bound Roper.
“That kid’s the best player in the state, right there, and I just hope … I just hope people realize the schedule that we play, and what he has to do, nightin, and night out.”
So far, the schedule’s been ramping up the difficulty, with the Eaglets (3-0) posting wins over Madison Heights Lam
phere and Flint Beecher prior to Wednesday’s tilt, pushed back a day by Tuesday’s snowstorm. Saturday, they’ll host an equally unblemished University of Detroit Jesuit squad.
“Coach Covert always wants us to play the hardest schedule, and for us to be 3-0 right now, playing some of the toughest teams, it shows how good we are. It’s only going to get harder from this game,” Roper said, acknowledging that the Eaglets picked up the defense after halftime. “Coach Covert is a great coach, and that’s one of the things he drilled into our head at the beginning of the season. Defensively, we lacked a little bit in the Beecher game, but we came back and made the adjustments this game, and as you could see, our defensive end, basically made the adjustment in the second half with their offensive rebounding. … Coach told us to put a foot on the neck, and don’t let up. That’s exactly what we did. Our goal was to make them take a timeout, right after halftime, and we did that.”
The Eaglets outscored Grand Blanc (3-1) by an 18-10 margin in the third, blowing open a game that had been 28-25 at the half.
Roper had a steal and an emphatic break-away dunk to give himself 11 points at the break, but picked up a technical foul with the postdunk celebration.
“He’s a hard a worker, and locked in … You hear that word ‘dog’ all the time — he’s a pit bull. He’s like that every day. He’s got energy, he’s tough,” Covert said. “Sometimes it can kind of get in his way a little bit, but he’s working through that, and how to be a better basketball player, and not just an athlete. Because he’s a superb athlete.”
He needed to use all of his 6-foot-4, 200-pound frame to handle the 6-5, 210-pound Rodgers, who is ranked as one of the top 50 players nationally in the class of 2022. He got plenty of help, and the Eaglets limited Rodgers to 13 points.
“We weren’t going to let Ty get off. Julian did a great job on him, but we had people all around him. He’s a phenomenal athlete — boy, oh boy. And (RJ) Taylor, reminds me a lot of Foster
(Loyer) — the kid is just a great player,” Covert said. “I think we’re pretty well-conditioned right now. We were able to get stops and out to run. I thought we played OK. I thought our defensive execution tonight, what we wanted to do on their ‘gets’ at the elbow, and the angles that we had to take — I credit my coaching staff for helping put in a great gameplan. We thought we had a chance at the end, going into it. Great, great defensive effort.”
St. Mary’s jumped out to a 7-0 lead on the Bobcats (3-1), then traded leads throughout the second quarter, after Grand Blanc fought back to take a lead just before the end of the first. Will Smythe’s buzzer-beating 3-pointer gave OLSM a 12-11 lead after one quarter. A Rodgers split at the line Grand Blanc its final lead at 16-14, then Roper’s 3-pointer midway through the second gave the Eaglets the lead for good, as OLSM held Rodgers to just two second-half buckets.
The Eaglets defense held Grand Blanc to just five second-half field goals before Taylor began a 10-point personal run with 2:41 left in the fourth, in an attempt to narrow the gap. Before that, the Eaglets had pushed the lead to 15 points on another Roper dunk, and a driving layup by Kareem Rozier.
“The kid that played phenomenal tonight — and you talk about valuable — Kareem Rozier, we don’t have him, we don’t win that game,” Covert said. “I know he doesn’t put up 30, but he is so valuable to our team, as far as leadership goes, and keeping people together. And just controlling the tempo when he has to. He’s a big-time point guard.’”
Roper scored eight points in the final four minutes of the game, as the Eaglets closed out the win.
“Just attacking, attacking the rim. Getting it to my teammates so I could get it back. My teammates did a great job of getting it to me, when I needed it, so we could do what we needed to do to get the ‘W,’” Roper said. “Being a leader, just doing what you gotta do. My teammates got me the ball in good positions to score, and tonight was my night. I just took over when they got me the ball. We all bought in — if one guy’s going, we’re all going to get him the ball, and you saw that down the stretch.”