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Devils dominate against Rebels
By ERIC FORTUNE
McDONALD
McDonald boys basketball coach Jeff Rasile admitted that it’s tough to play the balancing act of trying to get better while not trying to embarrass the opposition.
Through the first three games of this season, the Bue Devils’ average margin of victory has been 45.7 points.
The trend continued Tuesday night as they won going away over the Crestview Rebels, 105-43.
“I know tonight, the score was lopsided, but I felt the game was competitive,” Rasile said. “I thought it was very competitive. We try to factor that in. It’s not easy. It just gives people another reason to hate me. I’m used to it.
“It’s tough because of this reason. We’re not trying to embarrass anybody and run up the score. I know a lot of people say that about me. It’s just ... whatever. I have to coach my basketball team. I have a responsibility to my kids to get them ready. It’s only the fourth game of the year. We have a lot of work to do.”
The Blue Devils (4-0) were led by freshman Zach Rasile’s 24 points and six 3s. Joey Ragazzine and Braedon Poole added 21 and 20 points, respectively, and each had 10 rebounds.
Scott Murray led the Rebels (0-5) with 12 points.
“That’s great for us,” Jeff Rasile said. “It’s hard to stop us. They came out in that triangle-and-two. They tried to stop Rags and Zach. That’s taking a big chance when you have Dylan [Portolese], Evan [Magill], and Braedon. Pick your poison with us sometimes.”
McDonald jumped out to a 30-10 advantage after one quarter of play thanks in large part to Poole’s 10 points in the opening quarter. The Rebels, for a time, held Zach Rasile and Ragazzine in check.
The Rebels held serve in the second quarter as the Blue Devils were limited to 19 points on 7-of-18 shooting.
“It didn’t give us problems, but it made the game ugly enough that we would score in spurts,” Jeff Rasile said. “It’d be like we don’t score for two minutes and then we’d have 12 in a minute.
“I just thought the first half just wasn’t very clean on our end. We got the turnovers. We got the offensive rebounds, which is what we try to do. It just wasn’t very clean.”
Still, the Blue Devils held a 49-23 lead at the half, despite only holding a 23-22 advantage on the glass.
Zach Rasile found his stroke in the third quarter, making five of his game high six 3s in the frame as the Blue Devils nearly doubled their advantage over the Rebels after three at 85-35.
McDonald shot 13-of 17 from the floor while limiting Crestview to just eight shots in the third quarter.
“[Zach] had a slump,” Jeff Rasile said. “He struggled in the first half. They tried to take him out of the offense. Bang, five or six there in the third quarter. He has that ability. The thing about him in the first half was, as many as he missed, he was dead on. He’s a good enough shooter that he can turn that around in a hurry.”