PLYMOUTH — From the opening tip, St. Joe’s Indians could do very little wrong as they ran away with a 94-58 win over Plymouth on senior night at Plymouth high school.
The biggest positive on the night was Plymouth senior Dylan Gamble hitting the opening basket for the Pilgrims. Gamble went down to a broken foot after game one in his senior year. Barely out of a boot for his injury, both teams agreed that as a tribute to him for his senior year, to allow him to score Plymouth’s first basket. Immediately after that bucket, Gamble was subbed out to an ovation from the crowd and his teammates.
After that, St. Joe came out firing on all cylinders and the Pilgrims could not find an answer on either end of the floor.
“They (St. Joe) are awfully good and they played awfully well and we didn’t,” said Plymouth head coach Ryan Bales. “It’s tough for this to be the last home game and for us to go out this way but we have a week to figure some things out and try to find some answers. We are searching right now.”
They did not find those answers in 32 minutes as the Indians were white-hot shooting the basketball and Plymouth struggled offensively for much of the night.
The much-awaited return of Jake Reichard to the Plymouth lineup was anti-climactic as the Plymouth offensive weapon struggled to kick the rust off after seven games sidelined with an ankle injury. Reichard could manage just one free throw in the first half and 11 points total on the night.
Meanwhile, St. Joe showed off offensive weapons deep into their bench with four players in double figures led by Jake Futa with 25 points — 17 in the first half — and Notre Dame recruit JR Konieczny with 22
“They are an offensively explosive team and they have a lot of weapons,” said Bales. “We are simply just looking for five defensive guys and guys that are going to do little things and we could not find a mix tonight.”
Plymouth also struggled on the defensive end unable to find an answer for all the ways the Indians were able to find points.
“It seemed like everybody (for St. Joe) was doing their job. Everybody was hitting shots,” said Bales. “They share the ball so well similar to Northridge. They play off each other very well. They get the ball to the middle, they do a lot of good things.”
While the Pilgrims struggled to find good things Adam Hunter hit six threes to lead Plymouth with 20 points, Easton Strain had seven points and four rebounds, and on senior night, senior Grant Houin hit for five points and shared high rebound total with four.
Meanwhile the Pilgrims got more bad news as Reichard went down late in the contest with an injury to his other ankle.
“It’s not great but it’s day to day at this point,” said Bales after the game.
Plymouth falls to 6-16 on the year and will play next Friday in sectional action at LaPorte against either CMA or South Bend Riley. St. Joe is now 16-5.
•ST. JOE 94, PLYMOUTH 58
At Plymouth
Plymouth 14 24 43 58
St. Joe 18 48 76 94
Plymouth (58) — Hunter 6 2-2 20, Styers 0 0-0 0, Yoder 1 0-0 2, Reichard 3 3-4 11, Hissong 0 2-2 2, Feece 2 1-3 7, Houin 2 0-0 5, Gamble 1 0-0 2, Wray 0 2-2 2, Strain 2 2-2 7. 16 12-15 58.
St. Joe (94) — Litka 2 0-0 4, Hatkevich 3 0-0 9, Konieczny 8 4-4 22, A. O’Dell 4 1-1 11, Futa 9 1-1 25, Terry 3 0-0 6, J. O’Dell 1 0-0 2, Megyese 1 0-0 2, Walsh 0 0-1 0, Agnew 6 1-3 14. Totals 26 7-10 94.
