Raytown too good early as it rolls to easy win over LHS
Well on to the next game.
Yes, the Lansing High boys’ basketball team opened up the 2018 portion of this winter’s schedule in shaky form and due to that suffered a heavy loss Tuesday night, but don’t fret: head coach Mark McQuillan believes it can all be used to the betterment of the Lions.
Falling into a big deficit early, the Lions’ offense was still in hibernation - maybe from the recent run of chilly weather - or just holiday rust and within an hour had succumbed to a very athletic and strong Raytown (MO) squad, 71-36 in front of the Lansing faithful.
Logan Barnard led Lansing with 14 points while Jordan Remington added nine points for Lansing in the defeat.
“I think it’s easier to learn from losses than wins, and sometimes bad losses like this, even more,” McQuillan said. “We will go watch film and hopefully guys will learn what they can do better on the court. We just need more effort in preparation and at game time.
“Raytown shot the ball well and got in the flow of the game and we never did. We just seemed stagnant.”
It was quite the challenge for Lansing almost immediately as Raytown used its superior athleticism to set the tone from the tip.
The Lions had good intent on the defensive end and made Raytown have to earn its buckets, but that first miss on a possession turned into second-chance points for the Bluejays as they led 14-0 after eight minutes.
“I don’t want to discredit a team that handled us the way they did - they are a good team and a physical team,” McQuillan said. “We got in a hole early and we didn’t see the ball go in early…you got to keep playing and playing defense and we got away from what we can do offensively, by not moving and moving the ball around. We scored 36 points in a game and we are capable of more than that. We have to stay in the system and play as a group and not play one one five.”
Lansing finally got points as the second quarter launched, but Raytown was able to score more often and the lead ballooned to 37-14 at the intermission.
Raytown led 61-25 heading into the fourth quarter.
It may have been a 5-day break for Lansing in and around Christmas, but when a team is playing pretty well has to put on the brakes, it can slow the process down.
So combine youth with a slow down and throw in four practices to reboot, the results can be mixed.
“I thought we could, after watching Raytown on film, that we could definitely play with them,” McQuillan said. “No excuses, but we had some key guys with some injuries that limited them in practice. It was a positive environment in practice, but you have to remember they are teenagers coming off Christmas break and had only four days to practice.
“Early on we played good defense, had some opportunities and had some steals and we just weren’t finishing.”
OTHER SCORES:
Jefferson County North boys 60, PLEASANT RIDGE 57;
Jefferson County North girls, 50, PLEASANT RIDGE 39.