The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
ARC TRAJECTORY SKY HIGH IN ROAD ROUT
James pours in 38 as Brush tops Riverside
If someone were to look up the definition of domination in the dictionary, they would see a picture of Elmore James in the third quarter against Riverside.
James scored 23 of his 38 points in the third quarter to help Brush run away from the Beavers in a 79-53 Western Reserve Conference win. The Arcs move to 5-5 on the year, and Riverside is now 7-2.
While James had a big third quarter, it was a slower start for him as he had 13 in the first half and Brush led, 32-20, at halftime. The focus for the Arcs at halftime was the lack of energy they were showing, and that is what helped James have the showing he did.
“We felt like we lacked energy in the second quarter, so we had to pick it up a lot,” James said. “Coach Mason telling me, that made me and everyone else want to pick up the energy and intensity a lot more.”
Another thing Brush was able to do was control the tempo. Instead of Riverside running the ball up the court, the Beavers were taking their time, because Brush was applying a lot of fullcourt pressure and making it difficult for the Beavers to run.
The reason Riverside has been able to run in prior games is because it was coming down with a majority of the rebounds, but that wasn’t the case thanks to the 6-foot-8 duo of Tyler
Williams and Antwone Woolfolk.
Coach Chet Mason knows his two big men are a huge advantage for the Arcs.
“Having two players like that is a big advantage for us,” Mason said. “In addition to being that big, they are both able to get up and down the court easily, so we take advantage of that.
We want them to be the top two in the area in rebounding, and with two guys like them, we should dominate the glass.”
On top of James having 38, Williams had 16 and Andrew Jones had 12.
While Brush was controlling the pace, Riverside seemed to be a completely different team than
the rest of the season has shown. The Beavers weren’t controlling the pace of the game or getting to the rim as much as they typically do, rather settling for jump shots and not finding the open man. Coach Matt Grendel wasn’t upset with the way his team looked on the court. He instead saw this as a good learning opportunity
to see what his team could do better.
“We want to be able to play the game the way that we’ve been playing,” Grendel said. “We didn’t come out the way that we were hoping to or the way that we wanted to. This was a good test for us, and it showed us things that we can improve on.”
Leading the way for Riverside was Charlie Fox with 12 and Ian Ioppolo with nine, which he got on three straight 3-pointers in the fourth quarter.
The Beavers take on West Geauga on Jan. 23, while Brush plays on Jan. 24 vs. Cleveland Central Catholic at the Chet Mason Invitational.