Poor 1st half dooms Spoofhounds
JASON LAWRENCE/DAILY FORUM
Maryville senior guard Hagen Snow beats the Smithville defense down the court for a fastbreak layup during the third quarter of the Spoofhounds’ 55-31 loss to the Warriors in the third place game of the Cameron Tournament Saturday afternoon.
The Maryville boys’ basketball team dug too big of a first half hole Saturday afternoon against Smithville, falling 55-31 in the Cameron Tournament third place game.
The Spoofhounds fell behind quickly 10-0 as Smithville junior guard Ty Walters bagged a pair of three-pointer in the opening minutes. Maryville head coach Matt Stoecklein called timeout to regroup, but the longer Warriors weren’t having it.
The ended the first quarter up 17-0 — including another three-pointer from Walters — and limited the Spoofhounds to just a handful of shots while utilizing a stifling 2-3 zone.
“It bothered us tremendously,” Stoecklein said of Smithville’s size. “We’ve spent so much time working on man because that’s what we think we’ll face more in districts. Obviously, now we need to go and work on the zone.”
At the 5:28 mark of the second quarter, Maryville senior center Jacob Cacek got the Hounds on the board with a pair of free throws. Smithville countered with a 12-0 run to push its lead to 29-2 with just a few ticks left on the clock before halftime.
“You just don’t feel like you can do anything,” Stoecklein said. “’Well we could call this play, but that didn’t work.’ Then you miss the shot.”
Maryville sophomore guard Trey Oglesby took advantage of one of the few open looks the Smithville defense allowed, canning a three-pointer with five seconds left in the half. Smithville junior guard Campbell Lakatos immediately pushed the ball up the floor and was fouled, hitting 1-of-2 free throws to give the Warriors a 30-5 halftime lead.
Maryville (9-9) finally found a rhythm in the third quarter as junior guard Hagen Snow knocked down back-to-back three-pointers to bring the Hounds to within 32-11. Walters converted an and-one at the other end of the court before Snow bagged his third triple of the period.
“During halftime the coaches just said, ‘Come out and play basketball. We’ve got to fight back. All we’ve got to do is knock down this lead and keep chipping back,’” Snow said. “I’d been struggling all game. Just getting one to fall got me going. … it’s easy to play defense when you make shots. It’s hard to come back and play defense on missed shots.”
After sophomore guard John Zimmerman hit consecutive three-pointers and senior guard Payden Dawson hit a corner jumper from just outside the lane, Snow recorded a fastbreak layup for his 10th and 11th points of the period to cut the Smithville lead to 16 points.
“It was good to see that we came back the second half and hit some shots,” Stoecklein said. “That was the biggest difference. We missed them in the first. We made them in the second. That was the biggest difference.”
However, Walters beat the third-quarter buzzer with a triple to give the Warriors a 41-22 lead heading into the fourth quarter, and Maryville failed to cut any further into the deficit the rest of the way.
Snow’s 11 points led Maryville while Walters led the Warriors with a game-high 22 points and Lakatos finished with 12.
Maryville hits the road again Tuesday to take on Bishop LeBlond at 7 p.m. in St. Joseph. After losing to the Golden Eagles early in the season, the Spoofhounds knocked them off, 66-52, in the first round of the Cameron Tournament.
The Hounds don’t have to wait long for another shot at Smithville, either, as the Warriors travel to Maryville for a 7 p.m. tipoff Friday, Feb. 6.
“We know what they’re going to run, but it’s just so hard to beat it because they know what we’re going to do to,” Snow said. “We just gotta come out and practice on the zone offense, for sure.”
JASON LAWRENCE/DAILY FORUM
Maryville senior center Jacob Cacek floats a shot toward the rim after getting through a pair of Smithville defenders in the Spoofhounds’ 55-31 loss to the Warriors in the third place game of the Cameron Tournament Saturday afternoon.
JASON LAWRENCE/DAILY FORUM
Maryville junior guard Hagen Snow takes a three-pointer over Smithville’s Treston Horton in the third quarter of the Warriors’ 55-31 win over the Spoofhounds Saturday in the Cameron Tournament third place game. Snow hit three shots from deep in the third quarter and scored 11 points overall.
