1 2 3 4
Blazers (3-1) 1 16 13 4
Wootton (1-3) 9 15 14 15
SILVER SPRING - - "We had almost the same amount of turnovers as we had points. 34 points in the game, 29 turnovers."
Those were the words of Blair captain and power forward Leon Sampson, accurately describing the Blazers' sloppy performance against the visiting Wootton Patriots. The Blazers lost, 53-34, in a game that the Patriots controlled from the beginning. Wootton led at the end of the first quarter 9-1, and Blair's offense struggled to recover.
"We've got to take better care of the basketball, it's as simple as that," Sampson said. "You can't point the finger, can't look at anybody else, you've got to look in the mirror and say, 'It's our fault.' We had 29 turnovers. Of course we only scored 34 points and they scored, what, fifty-something? It was a horrible game. We've just got to get back to the drawing board and work."
Four Blair players had four turnovers or more - Sampson, Wayne Henderson, Cooper Neimand, and Cameron Reed (6).
"It was both an individual lack of concentration and a team effort," coach Mark DeStefano said of the turnovers. "When we play a certain style, when we get very individualistic, our overall spacing is bad and our overall execution is bad, and then that leads to turnovers, because guys think they have to do everything on their own. If we would just come down and run our offense, and do what the coaching staff asked them to do instead of doing their own thing, we would probably, right there, cut down on half of those turnovers. So, our kids have a decision to make. They can start to listen to all of the experts in the stands and on the Internet, or they can listen to the coaching staff and do what they're being asked to do, and not sulk about it, and not pout, and learn to play together as a team."
DeStefano said that the team needs to get back to the basic fundamentals of the game in order to improve.
"[We need to work on] catching the ball, passing the ball, dribbling the ball, just basic fundamental things, that we actually honestly do work hard on everyday," he said. "But for some reason, our guys hit a mental block about transferring what we do in practice to games. They seemed to think it's two separate things, and when you can't pass, catch, and dribble, it's a difficult game, it's a very difficult game."
The score at the half was 24-17 Patriots, but there would be no second-half comeback for the Blazers this game. The Blazers became visibly more frustrated as the game went along, and individual players tried to take the game into their own hands instead of playing with the team strategy, DeStefano said.
"We had guys make decisions with the ball in their hands tonight that were just simply poor decisions," he said. "It was a poor decision when they started, it got poorer as the decision went on, and it usually resulted in a poor result. I don't know why, like I said, if we had guys who could take five defenders off the dribble and get to the rim, we'd be Montrose Christian, we'd be nationally ranked, we'd be DeMatha, we'd be somewhere else. We're not them. We don't have those guys. Our guys have to learn to play together and take care of the basketball and get the best shot for the offense, not just 'Let me get the ball out of my hands and put something up that's weak or put something up that's not gonna help our team.'"
Wootton senior forward Brian Hollins had a game-high 12 points, including 3 three-pointers.
"We've just been shooting a lot in practice," Hollins said. "I mean, we shot 28% last game and that killed us. The practice just paid off, we were shooting the ball a lot better and that's sort of what our offense is meant to do."
Hollins said that Wootton's wide zone scheme helped cause many of Blair's turnovers.
"Our zone is pressed out a lot, so it's really wide," he said. "And it sorta cuts off all the passing lanes. There's a lot of stupid errors if you try to pass it, they do get cut off a lot, so that helped a lot too. We just wanted to spread our zone on 'em, and then when we did run man[-to-man], we were up on the passing lanes, too."
Sampson led the Blazers with ten points and nine rebounds, and senior forward Dayne Bolt had another successful game coming off the bench, scoring seven points with five rebounds.
"We had too many turnovers," Bolt said. "Way too many turnovers. We had missed opportunities on everybody's part, just about everybody had a mess up...more than one."
Bolt has gotten progressively more minutes since sitting out the first game against Einstein, taking away playing time from starting center Josh Kickenson. DeStefano, however, says that the team has no plans to change the starting lineup.
"One of the things that I really like about Dayne is he kinda plays fearless, he just kinda goes out there and plays," DeStefano said. "He's gonna make his mistakes, but he's also gonna make plays. I think we're probably not gonna change too much [in our lineup], because we're only 3-1. We won 3 games with a certain lineup, playing a certain rotation, so I don't think it's worth abandoning ship right now just because guys in that rotation are playing poorly. They have to learn to play better, they'll be given the opportunity to play better, but if they don't play better, than we'll have to find someone to step in and get the job done. We have to put the best team on the floor, reputation be damned of any individual."
Blair's next game is Friday, December 19, at home against 2-2 Churchill. Churchill has two Division-1 prospects in guard Elijah Gore, averaging 14.5 points per game this season, and forward Chase Hicks, averaging 15.5 points per game.
"They're very good," DeStefano said. "They've been battling some injury and illness. They are probably, on paper at least, the best team we've played so far this season. So, if we make an effort like we did tonight, it's gonna get a lot uglier before it gets prettier."
Tip-off is scheduled for 7 P.M.
Recent Comments