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Howland offense, defense too much for Campbell
By BRANDON JUDEH
HOWLAND
A relentless full-court press by the Howland High boys basketball team and plenty of turnovers by Campbell on Friday paved the way for an easy 75-38 win for the Tigers.
The Tigers’ defense was not the only thing that doomed Campbell — their offense, which is averaging 87 points per game so far, was just as potent.
“Our perimeter is strong and we have a bunch of kids who have grasped the offense very well to this point and they do a great job of executing the offense and running up and down the court,” Howland coach Bill Bogan said.
Bogan also noted that his defense’s strong play is directly leading to his offense scoring so many points.
Howland’s offense put up a staggering 80 shots while their defense held the Red Devils offense to 33 percent shooting; only making 14 buckets. According to Bogan much of this can be credited to their intense full-court pressure.
“Being at Harding for a number of years I watched Mentor come down and beat us with the same type of pressure,” Bogan said. “I copied that pressure and applied it to our team because we are similar to Mentor and it’s a system that is working very well for us.”
Showing a perfect example of what Bogan mentioned was lunior Brendan Cope who finished with a game-high 20 points and 10 rebounds. He added five steals.
“All of my teammates allowed me to feel comfortable out there and our defense lead our offense. I can’t give our defense enough credit, it allows us to score a lot,” Cope said.
Howland (2-0) pulled away in the second quarter thanks in large part to a 10-0 run lead by Cope that gave the Tigers a 17 point lead at halftime.
In the second half, the Tigers did not let up on Campbell (0-3) as they continued to play aggressively and give themselves more of a cushion.
Howland did well on the boards, especially in the second half, as the Tigers had several offense rebounds that lead to second chance points. The Tigers out-rebounded the Red Devils 41-31.
Also chipping in for Howland was another junior, Chris Maze who scored 16 points and distributed a game-high three assists. Kenny Pozega and Domenic Termine also played a big part in the victory, scoring eight points a piece.
There were some bright spots for the Red Devils as senior guard Anthony Naze scored 16 points including two three pointers. Defensively Devin Johnson, a 6-foot-5 senior, showed his presence down low as he recorded four blocked shots and grabbed six boards.