Photos by Heather Belcher
COAL CITY – Thursday’s game between Independence and Westside was missing many familiar faces.
Westside starter Bryson Blankenship sat out with a knee injury while Independence was without three starters, including leading scorer Michael McKinney – all suffering from sickness.
In a battle of attrition the team with the most bodies won – convincingly.
Westside erupted for 32 points in the second quarter, never looking back in a 77-51 win Tuesday in Coal City.
Following a quarter in which the undermanned Patriots trailed by only four, the Renegades’ relentless pressure and traps generated seven turnovers, holding Indy to six shot attempts in the frame.
“It clicked,” Westside coach Shawn Jenkins said. “We were pressing and sped the game up a little bit and that’s what we needed to get some easier buckets and I think we did that. I think that’s pretty much what the difference was.”
While the Patriots attempted just six field goals, the Renegades countered with 21 attempts in the second quarter, making 11 of them. The sharpshooting efforts of Evan Colucci and Brady St. Clair highlighted the quarter with the former scoring 11 points in the frame and the latter canning two 3-pointers for six off his eight points.
Free throws kept the Patriots in the frame early as they attempted 12 in the quarter but getting to the foul line wasn’t enough.
An Austin Cline layup made it a 23-13 game in favor of the Renegades and was followed by Colucci knocking down a pair at the charity stripe to push the lead to 12. The hosts cut it back to 10 on a pair of free throws by Cameron Vandell but Colucci, who was fouled on a 3-point attempt, answered with three of his own. A 3-pointer from St. Clair pushed the lead to 16 for the visitors and his second long ball later in the frame made it a 40-20 game.
“Losing three starters tonight, our game plan was to try and slow it down,” Indy coach Mike Green said. “We’ve been averaging over 60 shots a game ourselves. We were trying to keep it under 50 today, we just didn’t handle the pressure. It was a soft 2-2-1 pressure. It wasn’t anything that should’ve bothered us but we turned it over way too many times. We gave up easy shots and Evan has beat us every time we’ve played Westside. We tried to run him off the 3-point line but he shot well at the free throw line.”
A 3-pointer from Ryan Anderson accounted for the final three points of the half as the visitors took a comfortable 45-23 lead into the break. The game was never in doubt afterwards with the Renegades leading 64-33 after the third, coasting to the win.
On the evening the Renegades blistered the nets, shooting 42 percent from the field overall while canning 10 3-pointers. The other 20 makes came inside the arc. They also held the advantage on the boards, collecting 20 offensive rebounds.
The key to it all was the pressure defense applied by Westside. Even if facing a fully healthy team, the game plan would’ve remained the same for the Renegades.
“Whether they were healthy or not we were going to press them and see where it went,” Jenkins said. “See if we could get some easier buckets. The games so far, it seems like every bucket we’ve got so far has been earned. I was trying to figure a way to get them faster and maybe get some easier points. To do that you’ve got to press.”
Colucci led all scorers with 30 points while Independence’s Cyrus Goodson scored 27, with 16 coming in the second half.
“I was glad to see him score some points,” Jenkins said of Colucci. “He had been struggling shooting but tonight I was glad to see him get going. He’s our senior and he’s our main scorer so I was tickled to death to see him get going tonight.”
Westside improves to 2-3 on the season and will return to action on Dec. 28. Its scheduled game for Wednesday against PikeView was postponed.
Indy drops to 0-3 and will host Greenbrier West on Thursday.
W: 13 32 19 13 – 77
I: 9 14 10 18 – 51
Westside (2-3)
Evan Colucci 30, Dale Bledsoe 4, Ashton Reed 7, Ryan Anderson 12, Austin Cline 4, Brady St. Clair 8, Owen Keeny 4, Ethan Justice 3, Parker Lambert 4, Gage McKnight 3
Independence (0-3)
Cyrus Goodson 27, Carter Adkins 12, Corey Shumate 4, JD Monroe 2, Ryder Lawson 3, Cameron Vandell 3
3-point goals – W: 10 (Colucci 4, Anderson 2, St.Clair 2, Justice 1, McKnight 1); I: 3 (Goodson 1, Adkins 1, Lawson 1).
