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Reinartz, McCarter, McGlothin all score in double figures as Zebras improve top state defensive average; Stesiak hurts knee
BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS
Sports Editor, RTC
HAMLET –- Which boys basketball team in the state is more difficult to score upon than Rochester?
Right now, nobody.
The Zebras again showed off its defensive acumen with a 47-32 win over host Oregon-Davis at the Bobcat Den Saturday.
Kyle Reinartz scored a game-high 14 points to lead RHS, who improved to 6-1 and won their third road game in a five-day span. Grant McCarter hit three 3-pointers and scored 11, and Tarick McGlothin added 10.
Quin Stesiak had four points and six rebounds before being helped off the court with an apparent left leg injury with 6:03. RHS coach Rob Malchow said his knee “popped” but said that Stesiak was feeling better and walking around afterwards.
“Whatever it was, we’re hoping it wasn’t a big deal,” Malchow said.
Already leading 28-19, RHS opened the second half with a 9-0 run and led by as many as 18 points in the third quarter. O-D never got closer than 13 after that.
Gavin Sibo led the Bobcats (4-2) with 12 points, and Dylan Murphy added 11.
But the story was Rochester’s defense.
O-D came in averaging 56.6 points per game. The 32 they scored were a season-low. They had a seven-minute scoring drought covering the end of the second and start of the third quarters and another six-and-a-half minute drought during the fourth quarter.
O-D scored six points in the fourth quarter, and four of them came in the final 1:24 after the reserves came in.
Rochester is allowing 34.9 points per game. That is No. 1 in the state, per John Harrell’s Indiana Boys Basketball website. Only seven other teams in the state allow fewer than 40 points per game.
The Zebras also do it without fouling. O-D attempted only two free throws, none after the first quarter.
Malchow compared O-D’s offense to the “Memphis” offense that RHS uses, though not as much as in previous years. O-D set multitudes of screens to try to run players off the baseline. So how to handle the screens was a priority.
“They kind of spread the court and get four or five guys out and then try and drive the gaps,” Malchow said. “Maybe that kind of helped because we play against it in practice when we run it a little bit. So we had some experience with that.”
The first rule that players were told was to switch on ball screens. At the end of the game, the rule morphed: Switch on every screen.
Historically, it’s unusual for Malchow, who is in his 13th season as coach, to tell his players to switch on every screen.
The personnel he has this year allows for it as bigs like Reinartz, Stesiak and Blake Hughes can step out on the perimeter.
“The lineup we have at times, everybody can guard everybody if they don’t have a big,” Malchow explained. “Even I thought Blake did a good job, as big as he is, when he was in the game, rotating out on guards and still playing good defense.”
RHS went ahead for good at 13-10 with 1:25 left in the first quarter on a McGlothin 3-pointer from the right corner off a McCarter assist. That triggered an 18-3 that bled into the second quarter.
McCarter fed Reinartz for a layup off an inbounds play.
Braden Swanson hit a 3 for O-D, but two McCarter treys – one off a Reinartz assist and the other after a scramble for a loose ball – made it 21-13. A Reinartz transition layup, a McGlothin driving layup and another McGlothin 3 made it 28-13.
“I felt that we had some really good ball movement,” Malchow said. “And we had Tarick looking to score and Kyle. Overall and not just that piece of the game, but I thought this week we became a lot better basketball team in terms of guys offensively asserting themselves a lot better and knowing where to get people the ball. Because we have certain people in the post that we need to feed, and Aidan had a couple 3s this week where he stepped up and didn’t hesitate to shoot. Tarick – same thing. And of course, Grant’s doing what Grant’s doing, which is he’s such an offensive force that he draws so much attention it’s helping Tarick and Aidan a little bit, and they’re not shying away from knocking down shots right now.”
Reinartz picked up his second foul with 3:02 left, and O-D closed the half on a 6-0 run.
But to start the second half, Stesiak had a pair of putback baskets, and Reinartz had a putback and a flash post layup as the lead reached 37-19.
“Malchow does a great job with them,” Bobcats coach Larry Sennert said. “He gets a lot out of them. They’re fundamentally sound. They’re going to do everything right. That’s a credit to him and his program. They’re good, and they do what it takes to win the game. I thought we played as hard as they did, but we just couldn’t put the ball in the hoop.”
RHS also won the JV game 39-27. Dryden Vance led RHS with nine points, Brock Bowers had eight, Robert Bozzo had eight, Hunter Campbell had seven, Evan Elliott had six, and Kaiden Towell had one.
Rochester 47, Oregon-Davis 32
ROCHESTER (47) (6-1)
Grant McCarter 3 2-2 11, Tarick McGlothin 3 2-3 10, Aidan Smith 1 1-2 4, Quin Stesiak 2 0-0 4, Kyle Reinartz 7 0-0 14, Aaron Huffman 0 0-0 0, Trenton Reinholt 1 2-2 4, Evan Elliott 0 0-0 0, Blake Hughes 0 0-0 0, Dryden Vance 0 0-0 0, Brock Bowers 0 0-1 0, Reece Renie 0 0-0 0
TEAM: 17 7-10 47
OREGON-DAVIS (32) (4-2)
Gavin Sibo 5 0-0 12, Cameron Taylor 1 0-0 2, Layne Fisher 1 0-0 2, Conner Danford 0 0-2 0, Dylan Murphy 5 0-0 11, Kolton Saylor 0 0-0 0, Nolan Green 0 0-0 0, Ryan Pitts Jr. 0 0-0 0, Jared Bryan 1 0-0 2, Landon Green 0 0-0 0, Caleb Seese 0 0-0 0, Braden Swanson 1 0-0 3, Connor Frazier 0 0-0 0, Unidentified No. 31 0 0-0 0
TEAM: 14 0-2 32
Three-point field goals:
Rochester 6 (McCarter 3, McGlothin 2, Smith),
Oregon-Davis 4 (Sibo 2, Murphy, Swanson)
Total fouls: Rochester 7, Oregon-Davis 16
Turnovers: Rochester 17, Oregon-Davis 11
Score by quarters
Rochester 13 15 13 6 – 47
Oregon-Davis 10 9 7 6 – 32
JV: Rochester 39, Oregon-Davis 27
Rochester’s Kyle Reinartz scored a game-high 19 points in a 43-41 win over Whitko Friday and a game-high 14 points in a 47-32 win over Oregon-Davis Saturday.
