Conant quickly works back to winning approach
Was the Joe Majkowski Thanksgiving Tournament at St. Viator a good gathering of teams, or a prospective preview of the best of the Mid-Suburban East and West?
Perhaps both, as Prospect (East) and Conant (West) both fared well here in tough competition.
Conant closed out particularly effectively Saturday evening with a 59-38 win over the hosts, who had been making progress to that point.
But it's tough to make progress against a Conant (4-1) team that is experienced, shoots 10 of 18 from 3-point range, 24 of 44 overall and even more impressively, registers 14 consecutive stops on defense against a Lions (1-4) squad with some pretty good offensive weapons.
"We shot the ball really well," said Conant coach Tom McCormack, who noted that assistant Matt Walsh tracked those 14 consecutive stops when Conant extended a 19-15 first-quarter lead into an eventual 53-28 lead after three quarters, limiting the Lions to just 3 points in the third quarter.
But it was more than that for the Cougars.
"We just bounced back from a bad night," in the previous game, said Conant point guard Dan Ranallo, referring to a lopsided loss to tournament champion Evanston. Ranallo scored all of his 14 points in the first quarter on 5-for-5 shooting, four of them 3s.
"As soon as that first one went in, my guys kept getting me the ball," he said through a grin.
But Ranallo also acknowledged the defensive effort that was so critical.
Between 6-foot-9 Ryan Davis and high-jumping Mike Downing, the Cougars blocked 3 shots and altered many others, in addition to controlling the boards. Davis nailed a trio of 3s to confound St. Viator's defense and Downing had a pair of crowd-rousing alley-oop dunks on feeds from Jimmy Sotos.
By the time Sotos hit a third-quarter 3 to make it 44-25, Conant was en route to outscoring the hosts 17-3 in the period. Davis added a trey and converted a lob from Sotos, and C.J. Deshazer was driving the Lions berserk with his ballhawking, shooting and ballhandling.
"That's what really got us going, was the defense," said Ranallo.
And did in St. Viator, which had no long-term answer for Conant's pressure and sharpshooting. The Lions opened up by keeping pace, as 6-foot-8 Addison Lubert had 3 first-half hoops and sophomore bright light Jeremiah Hernandez battled hard inside against Downing and Davis while Andrew Soukop and Peter Lambesis added some offense.
But after shooting 7 of 11 in the first quarter, St. Viator couldn't muster anything better than 9 of 24 the rest of the way, 3 of 10 from beyond the arch.
Conant will take the week now to regroup and sharpen up - "get back in the lab and get to work," as Ranallo phrased it, and then dive into its Mid-Suburban League schedule.
"Just keep working together," as he put it.