Bremen knocks off Laville, already at win No. 2
LAKEVILLE — Area high school boys basketball rivals Laville and Bremen renewed acquaintances for an early season contest at Dale E. Cox Gymnasium Thursday. Led by its active defense and a breakout game by freshman Chase Devine, it was the Lions coming away with the 52-45 victory over the Lancers.
“Unbelievable,” said Bremen head coach Matt Miller, whose improved team has already matched last year’s win total. “We talked about toughness all week because I didn’t think we were tough last week. They lived it out big time.”
Devine had two 3s and tallied 10 of his game-high 26 points in the first quarter, including the last five of the period to stake the Lions to a six-point lead.
“In a game like this, to have a guy (Devine) that can get some points on his own is a whole new world for us lately,” added Miller. “When you have to grind and you don’t really have any offense going, but he can go get something, that’s great for us. He’s a security blanket for us right now. We need to make sure that he doesn’t become everybody’s pacifier.”
The gap reached as high as 12 in the second stanza thanks to a couple of wide open layups by Camden Hickman off great feeds from Devine and Tyrus Graverson before the Lancers put together a 9-3 run just before halftime to stay within six, 23-17, at the break.
Between Bremen’s scrappy defensive play and LV missing the mark from the outside in the first half, the Lancers changed tactics and starting going exclusively inside. Michael Good scored 15 of his teamhigh 17 points after intermission, with five buckets in the paint, and the home team was able to get within one point on five occasions in the third period, the last time at 34-33 heading to the final frame.
“We were sweating it there for a while,” Miller said. “We did just enough. Good took advantage of us down low, which we knew was a possibility, but we did a good job on the perimeter shooters. A lot of times we traded 3s for 2s.”
The fourth quarter ended up being Bremen’s best eight minutes of the game. Devine scored nine more points, reserve Anthony Torres provided some key plays, and the entire Lions team handled the ball well enough to space the court and use clock as the lead reached eight with less than a minute to play. From there, Bremen hit 5-of-8 from the foul line to offset a three-point play by Good and a 3 from Collin Czarnecki - LV’S only triple of the game.
“If there were 10,000 possibilities for how this game played out, I would have never got to that scenario,” concluded Miller. “However minutes Torres played tonight is his whole career.”
Laville travels to Argos next Tuesday while Bremen hits the road to Tippecanoe Valley Saturday night for its next game.
• BREMEN 52, LAVILLE 45
At Lakeville
BREMEN: Luke Kincaid 0 0-0 0, Camden Hickman 4 0-0 8, Chase Devine 10 3-3 26, Tyrus Graverson 2 1-2 5, Silas Laidig 2 2-4 7, Noah Wildauer 1 0-0 2, Adam Hunziker 0 0-0 0, Julian Alvarado 1 0-0 2, Anthony Torres 1 0-0 2. TOTALS: 21 6-9 52.
LAVILLE: Lucas Plummer 0 2-2 2, Lance Edison 2 1-2 5, Cody Allen 0 0-0 0, Travis Madondo 0 0-0 0, Andre Gonzales 0 0-0 0, Collin Czarnecki 6 2-4 15, Michael Good 7 3-3 17, Braedyn Foster 2 0-0 4, Avery Garrett 1 0-0 2. TOTALS: 18 8-11 45.
Score by quarters
Bremen 12 23 34 52 Laville 6 17 33 45 3-pointers: Laville 1 (Czarnecki), Bremen 4 (Devine 3, Laidig). Fouls (fouled out): Laville 14 (none), Bremen 15 (none). Records: Laville 0-1, Bremen 2-0 JV score: Laville 39, Bremen 32