Union Local Starts Fast In Rolling Past St. Clairsville By 15
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MORRISTOWN - Union Local got off to a slow start earlier this week in a loss to visiting Cambridge. St. Clairsville, meanwhile, started off fast in a convincing victory over Bellaire at home.
Thursday night, the scripts were flipped as the host Jets (4-1) flew out to a 22-8 lead after one quarter en route to a 78-63 triumph over the Jets before a large gathering inside 'The Hangar' on the Union Local campus.
"That felt pretty good. I'm not going to lie to you," Union Local head coach Zach Delman said after the win. "We preached the last two days (after the loss to Cambridge) about how important it was to play better in the first quarter. I'm not sure if we could've played any better than we did, but I don't want to say we could or couldn't. You always hope you can, but you just never know."
Senior Dre Saunders once again fueled the Jets fast start. The cat-quick point guard had eight points in the first quarter, as did backcourt mate Brandon Mehl. However, Saunders lit it up for 12 points in the second quarter as Union Local built a 42-23 advantage.
"We had a game plan and we executed it," Delman added. "Dre (Saunders) got us going in the first half with 20 points. He didn't score in the second but he did a lot of the little things that don't show up in the boxscore."
St. Clairsville head coach Ryan Clifford said the game was lost early on.
"I just told the kids that when you're No. 1 focus isn't on the game at hand, maybe we were thinking a little too high of ourselves after one night with a veteran group like this is disappointing. You shouldn't have to talk about those types of things." he said. Maybe we read some press clippings from the other night or whatever. We weren't ready to play at all. It wasn't St. Clairsville basketball."
The Red Devils made their move in the third quarter, forcing nine Union Local turnovers and cutting what had been a 24-point lead (49-25) to 12 (58-46) at the end of the quarter. However, the Jets got back on track in the fourth and ran their delay game to near-perfection, resulting in some easy backdoor baskets.
"I thought we faltered a little bit there in the third quarter ... We showed some signs of panic, but, overall, I was pretty happy with how we overcame that bit of adversity," Delman said. "They got it to 12 but we were able to push it out a little bit in the fourth quarter.
"We still have to get better. It's still early and there's a lot of room for growth yet," Delman noted. "You can't always come out and play this well. We've got to make sure our guys are buying in and doing the little things to give ourselves a chance every night.
"They (St. Clairsville) are good. They've got some talented kids, but tried to take away some of their big scorers and make the other guys beat us. I thought we did a very good job on (Tyson) pastor and the Straub kid."
"But 24 points is a huge hole to try and dig yourselves out of," Clifford admitted. "We talked at halftime that if we could get it (the lead) to 12 by the end of the third quarter, we'd be alright, but we had spent too much gas trying to get back in it."
In addition to his 20 points, Saunders handed out seven assists. Mehl led the way with 24, including four treys, while Billy Schumacher added 14 points and Brody Gregor 10. Schumacher also pulled down eight rebounds. Gregor had 10 assists and five rebounds.
"He battled foul trouble, but it was a big game for a sophomore," Delman said of Gregor.
Union Local recorded 18 turnovers, while St. Clairsville was guilty of 16.
"It's way early but our execution wasn't great either," Clifford said. "We couldn't make a shot early."
Tyson Pastor scored 23 points for the Red Devils (1-1). Brady Schafer added 16 and Griffin Straub turned in 10 points and eight rebounds.