Things were different for the Mexico boys on Friday.
Yes, they were celebrating Winterwarming, but the Bulldogs on the court looked different than in their first meeting with conference and …
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Things were different for the Mexico boys on Friday.
Yes, they were celebrating Winterwarming, but the Bulldogs on the court looked different than in their first meeting with conference and district rival Kirksville. Class 4 No. 7 Mexico won 57-50 in Kirksville about a month ago and capped Winterwarming with a 53-33 victory.
Head coach Darren Pappas said the home court factor helped and so did having Mr. Bulldog candidate Kaden Benne back on the court. However, there were more factors that made the difference.
“Our young guys stepped up,” Pappas said. “I thought Matai (Holman) did a good job giving us good minutes off the bench and so did Quincy (Bruce) and Houston Fowler. We’re going to need those guys to step up and produce at a high level off the bench.”
Mexico (14-4, 5-0 NCMC) led 19-15 late in the second quarter before Holman knocked down two 3-pointers. His teammates were able to find Holman open on the perimeter to help Mexico take a 25-16 halftime lead. Bruce had five points, including a layup after cutting along the baseline in the fourth quarter.
In previous weeks, Pappas has described Mexico’s offense as “stagnant.” That wasn’t the case on Friday as the Bulldogs were moving around and finding teammates for open shots. This culminated in the Bulldogs outscoring Kirksville (11-4, 2-2 NCMC) 14-4 in the fourth quarter.
“We were patient,” Pappas said. “In the fourth quarter, we did a good job of breaking down their defense and seeing where the help was coming from. Kaden and Charlie (Fisher) did a good job of attacking the paint. It was good ball movement.”
Fisher led Mexico with 13 points and four assists, Benne had 10 points and three steals, and James Matthews added eight points.
The Kirksville game was Benne’s fifth game back from injury, and he said he is happy to be playing again with “my guys.” He said they have “great chemistry” and showed that against the Tigers.
“We moved the ball better,” Benne said. “We’ve been working a lot on cutting, coming off screens with authority, and looking for other guys and not trying to go one-on-one.”
Pappas said Mexico wanted to contain Kirksville on the perimeter after the Tigers hit seven 3-pointers in the first meeting. The Tigers finished with three 3-pointers this time and didn’t have one in the second half.
Kirksville didn’t have many second-chance opportunities this time either, Pappas said, and that was after Mexico sat down and guarded. He said Kirksville likes searching for the best possible shot.
“We did a good job of mixing it up and keeping them off-balance,” Pappas said. “There were long possessions, and we defended really well. I would like our communication to get a little bit better, but I thought we did a good job of being on guys on the catch, containing drives and running them off the 3-point line.”
Mexico has both regular season wins over Kirksville to take advantage in the conference and district seeding race.
“We never want to overlook a team,” Benne said. “We beat them twice, but they’re still a great basketball team. We’ve just got to come out and do our thing.”
Pappas calls a win like this “a huge thing” and these games stand out on the schedule.
“We have to make sure we take care of business every single game, stick to our scouting reports, watch film and get better every single week,” Pappas said.
