Timothy Christian outruns Manley

At Lisle's Playing for Pride Shootout, Timothy Christian found an opponent that liked to race up and down the court as much as the Trojans do.

Timothy did it better on Saturday, beating Manley 93-67. The Trojans got 23 points from both Rob Stein and Justin Peeples and 16 points plus 4 steals from All-Area guard Reggie Greenwood.

"We don't see a lot of city teams who go up-tempo more than we're used to," said Stein, whose big body helped Timothy Christian (6-2) post a 36-28 rebounding advantage, 14-10 on the offensive glass.

"But we like to play up-tempo, too, so that was nice - to play with an up-tempo team and come out here with a good win," Stein said.

It sure beat two straight losses out of the Metro Suburban Conference, including Friday's 77-39 comeuppance at Riverside-Brookfield.

"We're in that stretch (where) we're playing a lot of really tough teams here," said Trojans coach Jack LeGrand. "I was really curious how we were going to respond to that - obviously, last night being a low point. But we got right back at it today."

Manley, a 4-5 club out of the Chicago Public League Red-West, didn't have much size to speak of either and was content to run with Timothy.

The Trojans' ball-sharing abilities - and nice contributions by sophomore Matt Morrison and junior Chad Vos to complement starters Stein, Peeples, Greenwood, Michael Pizzello and Mark Penzcak - were too much for the Wildcats.

"As a guard-filled team," Greenwood said, "we've got to make open passes and make open shots."

A Greenwood 3 from the left baseline capped the first quarter with Timothy up 25-15. Manley cut it to 37-32, as guard Javan Linston's 3-point range knew no limit and Damontag Washington bulled inside, but the Trojans pushed it back up to 49-36 at halftime.

Linston, who scored 19 points to Washington's 20, swished a 25-foot 3-pointer to get Manley within 60-54 at 2:32 of the third quarter.

The Trojans responded with an 11-0 run that took them into the fourth quarter and were on their way to setting the Playing for Pride scoring record. The teams' combined 160 points also were a record.

"This game was an up-and-down battle a little bit, and that kind of played to some of our strengths," LeGrand said.