Boys Basketball: Skyline Eagles fly past undermanned Dreadnaughts
When Dexter boys’ basketball coach Jason Rushton looks down his bench he feels bad for his players. And for very good reason.
“We have two kids in a walking boot, one with a broken nose and another with stitches down his lip and chin,” says Rushton. “We’re a little banged up, but that’s what’s great about these young guys, they keep battling.”
Meanwhile, Skyline did what Skyline does …
“We set the tone for the game starting with a strong defensive intensity,” said Skyline Coach Mike Lovelace. “We were then able to sustain the defensive effort for the majority of all four quarters.”
The Eagles did their thing and took advantage of their hurting hosts in a 72-43 win in an SEC Red matchup on Friday night.
Skyline jumped out to an early lead in the first quarter and held Dexter scoreless for multiple possessions. The Eagles made things difficult on Dexter’s strengths offensively and was able to push the ball and score inside for a 19-8 first quarter lead.
“We have had problems this year with foul trouble and that did continue in the first half as several of our players had two fouls and one with three,” Lovelace said. “But we were able to limit the Dexter damage from the free-throw line.”
Skyline managed to build the lead to 32-19 going into the half.
In the second half, Skyline cleaned up some of the unneeded fouls and played with more defensive discipline and looked for better scoring opportunities on offense and pushed the lead higher and higher.
Skyline finished the third quarter up 53-30.
“We had excellent contributions from all of our rotation players on both ends of the court,” said Lovelace. “Abdul-Aziz had an outstanding game defending Dexter’s Cal Bavineau.”
Skyline’s Jayden Potts led all scorers with 23 points, including 14 in the second half. He also had eight rebounds and four assists. Ben Stille knocked down two triples and finished with 18 points to go with eight rebounds and four assists. Sam Koelling had 10 points and Will Gardner scored nine and grabbed 13 rebounds for the Eagles.
Kaleb Schlecht had 4 points and 4 rebounds; Abdul Aziz had 3 points and 2 rebounds; James Harrison Jr. had 3 points and 3 rebounds; and Lucas Lynch had 3 rebounds and 3 assists.
Cal Bavineau led Dexter with 13 points, 5 assists and 4 rebounds. Ty Rychener and Cole Arnedt each had 8 points.
Dexter plays at Pioneer on Tuesday while Skyline hosts Monroe on Tuesday.
