Conant makes gains vs. Warren

Conant and Warren are both eager to show they are better than their records, and that they have the jump starts within them to prove it.

After Saturday night's 56-40 Conant homecourt victory, the Cougars are rolling in the right direction while Warren is still looking for jumper cables.

Conant overcame foul trouble and a height disadvantage to first hold off and then pull away from the talented and athletic but young Blue Devils.

"We've had some tough losses. They hung with it," said Conant leading scorer Christian Sotos of his teammates. "Everyone did what they had to do."

That included play defense. Conant limited Warren to 16-of-39 shooting from the floor and only 9 tries from the free throw line. It also included rebounding, and the Cougars out-boarded the taller Blue Devils 24-15.

"Nate Rummel played one of his best games," said Conant coach Tom McCormack of his 6-foot-7 senior center.

And even as they struggled at times with their shooting and were bothered by the lightning quickness of Blue Devil guards Andra Manson (team-high 8 points) and Craig Burton, the Cougars (5-4) never stopped rebounding and playing defense - even when they got into some foul trouble.

"My teammates helped me out on the defensive end," said Sotos, who played with 2 fouls in the first half and 3 in third quarter when his steady offensive hand (22 points) was still very much needed. "We have some very athletic guys."

One of them is Garett Gatz, who stuck with it through a tough shooting night to finally knock down a big fourth-quarter 3-pointer. And then there's Andrew Spengler, whose court sense showed on some brilliant backdoor feeds for baskets to his teammates. London Dokubo, Mike Keegan and Brian Wadsworth provided some key minutes off the bench too. Gatz and Taylor Peterson kept hammering the boards against the taller Devils.

"We just didn't play well. We're not playing with a lot of heart right now," said veteran Warren coach Chuck Ramsey, whose team also has lost some close ones on the way to a 2-7 record. Ramsey only knows one way to get it going.

"You've got to work your way out of it," he said. "The kids work hard. You've got to step forward."

Manson and Burton did, with help from big Nate Boothe and Jon Geske, but even their close-range shots refused to fall more often than not.

And even though Conant did not have one of its better shooting performances, "They still put it to us," Ramsey said. "We couldn't get a stop. We couldn't score."