History was in the air in the Jordan gym Monday at the Dr. Floyd Massey Jr./MLK Day Basketball Spectacular, as clips from Dr. King’s greatest speeches were played during halftime of each of the three games, and the crowd buzzed about the upcoming inauguration. In between, there was some pretty good basketball too, as both Long Beach teams won—the Poly Jackrabbits defeated the Mayfair Monsoons for a second time this season, 65-48, and the home-court Panthers repelled the Bev Hills Normans’ invasion, winning 83-59. (LA Jordan topped Muir 64-47 in the early game.)
For the ‘Rabbits, it was the same story it’s been all season: defense, defense, defense. After the explosive play of Monsoons point guard Tim Douglas in the first quarter kept Mayfair close, Poly switched to a zone defense, clogging the lane, and limiting Douglas (who scored eleven of his team’s 17 in the opening period) to just six points for the rest of the game. But Douglas, who didn’t get a point in the second quarter, wasn’t the only Monsoon shut down—Mayfair only mustered a total of five points in the second, giving Poly a 38-22 lead. After allowing only another ten points in the third, Poly went on to win another defensively-motivated contest.
“I thought it was a great effort,” said Poly coach Sharrief Metoyer. “We expected them to come out with revenge on their mind, and we wanted to try to match their intensity.”
Leaders for the ‘Rabbits were Mike Mayes, with 14 points, sophomore Ryan Anderson who had seven points, nine rebounds (to lead all players), three assists and three blocks. Big man Julian Camper contributed eleven points, and his presence allowed Poly’s guards to work in space on the perimeter (the ‘Rabbits shot 50% to the Monsoons’ 30%). Alexis Moore chipped in another ten, as well as a great defensive effort. For the Monsoon, there weren’t many highlights beyond Douglas (17 points on 5/14 shooting)—their best overall player, Kyle Richardson, who’s committed to Long Beach State, struggled to overcome the height of Ryan Anderson and the strength of Julian Camper, but still looked pretty good in a two-point, five-rebound performance. 49ers fans will be happy to note that he’s got good footwork, a natural defensive presence, and moves well with the ball.
Though the box score shows that the Panthers only won by seven points more than Poly, the game was nowhere near as close, as Jordan was up 38-17 at halftime and rarely played their starters in the second half. The Bev Hills Normans were a scrappy team sound in fundamentals, but ultimately too undersized and not athletic enough to hang with the Panthers. Jordan finished with more rebounds than the Normans had attempted field goals, more offensive rebounds (22) than Bev Hills had total rebounds (11), and as many steals/blocks as the Normans had converted shots.
The lone highlight for the Normans was Greg Townsend, who finished with 26 points on 10/20 shooting and 6/13 FTs, eight rebounds, two steals and a block. For Jordan, the game was like watching several individual highlight reels spliced together into a fun-to-watch, but ultimately incomplete team performance. Aside from the stat dominance above, there were four Panthers who scored in the double digits, including Stephan Heard (twelve points, seven rebounds, three steals, three blocks), and Chris Thomas, who had 16 points on 7/11 shooting). “I thought we played a solid game,” said Thomas. “But as we move into league, we’re going to need to pick up our defense.”
That would be the defense that gave up 42 points in the second half to a team they outsized and outran, a defense that let Wilson back into the game last Friday, and a defense that never managed to get a handle on Poly in their Wednesday showdown.
“It was a good experience for the team,” said Panthers coach Ron Massey. “We were fired up for the game, and then we found out we had to wait [a communication error caused the Normans to arrive about an hour later than expected], and we had to see if we could get fired back up. We didn’t.” Well, it wasn’t for a lack of warming up.