McHenry gets past Grant
Jerry Gaylor wasn't the same.
Neither were his Grant teammates.
McHenry wasn't the same basketball team either.
But as McHenry's Brian Madson walked out of Grant's field house during the third quarter of Wednesday night's nonconference game, wearing street clothes and a black bandage around his head, it was the same ol' Brian Madson.
The likable senior smiled at McHenry fans, who smiled back, albeit concerned for their basketball hero. Madson was en route to have X-rays after taking a frightening tumble during the second quarter of McHenry's 59-45 win.
“That was one of the worst falls I've seen in a game,” McHenry coach Tim Paddock said.
Grant was leading 21-15 when the 6-foot-5 Madson got the ball on a fastbreak. As he drove hard to the basket, the 6-3 Gaylor slid in front of him. The two players collided and Madson did a complete flip, crashing hard, landing on his back and hitting the back of his head on the court.
To add insult to injury, Madson was whistled for a charge.
“I went up to go see him and he tried lifting his head up,” McHenry guard Kyle Melton said. “There were a couple of drops of blood on the floor.”
Madson walked off on his own power, holding a towel to his head to absorb the blood.
“He was talking to us (while laying on the court),” Grant coach Wayne Bosworth said. “He didn't feel dizzy or anything.”
“He wanted to get back in the game,” Melton said of his teammate. “But there was no way that was happening.”
Gaylor was OK, but sick at the thought of what just happened to Madson.
“I'd rather have him dunk on me than take a fall like that,” Gaylor said.
“I just walked to the back. I felt so bad about that. I was just afraid he was hurt worse than he was.”
When play resumed with 5:09 left before halftime, Grant's Sean Wells scored on an acrobatic layup to extend the Bulldogs' lead to 23-15. But Melton drove baseline and scored, and 6-4 Robert Tonyan, who played huge in Madson's place, scored on back-to-back putbacks. The Warriors finished the half with an 11-2 run and led 26-25.
“Madson is a great player and I hope he's OK,” Bosworth said. “When he went out of the game, we should have been able to put a run on them at that point. It went the exact opposite way. It was almost like our kids felt so bad that they didn't come out and play.”
Gaylor had 8 points in the first quarter on a pair of 3-pointers and a dunk but didn't score another basket until another slam in the final seconds. He was admittedly affected by Madson's fall.
“It gets in your head a little bit,” said Gaylor, who finished with 11 points, going just 1 of 6 from the foul line. “I think it helped (McHenry) knowing that their big man was out so they needed to push a little harder.”
Grant's 6-4 Ilya Kadushin had held Madson (0 points, 3 rebounds) without a basket in the opening quarter. Kadushin started in place of Kyle Lombardino, who sprained his ankle in practice Tuesday, and finished with 11 points and 8 rebounds.
“You got to give him a lot of credit,” Bosworth said of Kadushin. “He played intense defense on Madson in the first quarter. I thought he did a great job on him.”
A Tonyan dunk, off a Melton dish, had McHenry up 39-28 in the third quarter. Little went right for Grant the rest of the way.
“Our hearts, I don't know where they went,” Bosworth said. “We had no intensity. I felt bad for anyone who came and watched us play. That first quarter was probably one of the best quarters we've played this season. Our defense was good. Our offense was there. We were moving. We were playing intense. But our intensity completely disappeared.”
Tonyan played huge off the bench, posting game highs of 14 points and 14 rebounds.
“He's been stepping up the past couple of games — big rebounds, big points, dunks to get the team going,” Melton said. “He's a good athlete.”
Melton (12 points, 7 rebounds, 7 assists), Pat Maher (11 points) and 6-4 Jimmy Preston (10 points, 7 rebounds) also scored in double figures for McHenry. Kyle Frantz, coming off a broken wrist, scored 8 points (two 3-pointers) in his season debut.
“Grant plays aggressive and speeds you up,” Paddock said. “With our leading scorer (Madson) going down like that, guys can look around and feel sorry for themselves. But I think tonight it really helped them rally around each other.”