Marmion dispatches Montini
For the first half on Friday, Montini was right with Marmion.
In the second half the Cadets' advantages - height, experience, guard depth, slashing senior Mark Peters - came to the fore, and Marmion cruised past the feisty visitors 70-34 in Aurora.
Held to 1 point after one quarter and 7 at the half, the 6-foot-6 Peters finished with 24 points.
"Our guards broke down the defense, got us more open shots toward the rim, and it was easier for us," said Peters, whose 5 rebounds all were offensive boards.
Marmion collected 18 offensive rebounds, more than the total of 15 by Suburban Christian Blue foe Montini (1-6, 0-3).
Marmion guards Greg Askwith, Nick Scoliere and Tyler Hlavac combined for 12 of Marmion's 34 total rebounds, and helped force 20 Montini turnovers while the Cadets made but 7.
"A good thing of being a guard, you get a rebound, you can push the ball up the floor," said Marmion coach Rashon Burno, who knows stuff like that, being a former guard at DePaul.
"So that led to a lot of easy baskets," he said. "We got a lot of points in transition, we beat that 2-3 (zone of Montini) back and that's playing in our favor when we've got slashers like Mark and Tyler."
Marmion (5-4, 2-1) took an 11-3 lead but allowed Montini's Tyshawn Johnson to nail successive 3-pointers and get down a buzzer-beating tip-in to end the first quarter tied 11-11.
Montini, which started three sophomores and two juniors and has no seniors on its roster, took its sole lead, 17-16, at 3:32 of the second quarter. Johnson, fellow guard Tim Perlowski and forward Kaniel Burke supplied a 6-0 mini-run.
A Peters' putback, a drive by Nick Scoliere and 2 Peters free throws gave Marmion a 22-17 halftime lead and momentum.
"If you would have told me going into that (game) we would have had a lead in the second quarter I would have been pretty happy and excited, and down five at half I was excited. Our kids battled," said Montini coach Brian Opoka.
That they did. But Marmion scored the first 10 points of the third quarter and, outrebounding Montini 11-1 with 6 offensive boards, led the Broncos 40-23 entering the fourth quarter.
"They just came out stronger than us in the second half. We weren't ready for that," said Montini forward Rich Bodee, who in the first half was in the middle of 2-3 and 2-1-2 zones that had frustrated Peters.
Marmion then was off to the races with a 30-point fourth quarter. Hlavac finished with 9 and both Askwith and center Graham Glasgow scored 8 points. Johnson led Montini with 11.