This was finally going to be the year that Madison Memorial's streak of 11 straight conference titles was going to end. Sun Prairie was the odds on favorite to win conference led by Marquette recruit Nick Noskowiak. Sun Prairie was the leader of the pack until Noskowiak left the team and school dealing with some personal issues and I wish him the best in dealing with these issues and hoping he can get past these issues. Sun Prairie hasn't been able to find their footing since losing Noskowiak. Then Middleton was the top team and Memorial promptly bet them by 20. Madison East was the next team to step up until Memorial took them down by 20 as well. Middleton is now still top in the standings but, with the way Memorial is playing that doesn't appear to be long lasting.
Friday decided to take in the Memorial vs La Follette game. It's been a little while so honestly I can't remember a ton about the game after taking in two games. Some lastly impressions was the lack of La Follette offense in this game. I believe La Follette was running a dribble drive offense but, it just seemed to be a lot of one on one ball with whoever had the ball would just drive to the hoop and try to score. This offense ended up with a lot of forced wild shots in the lane that just weren't falling. Also noticeable in this game was the play of their star 6'1 senior Darold Thomas. I know Thomas has just recently missed a handful of games for whatever reason and he just didn't seem himself. Thomas appeared to be in some pain on the court and spent a good deal of time on the bench. Normally Thomas plays with a pretty high energy and is pretty aggressive on the court but, tonight Thomas seemed a little passive on defense and offense, where his game was mostly launching NBA threes and missing them. 5'11 Quinten Shere did his best to keep La Follette in this game but, he just couldn't get any help.
For Memorial I was hoping to see their leading scorer 5'10 Shareef Smith have a big game but, Smith got in early foul trouble and didn't even score in the game. Smith did have some nice assists but, never got in the flow of the game shooting the ball. Memorial didn't shoot the ball particularly well but, as usual they did dominate the glass and got second and third opportunities all game long. No one really stared for Memorial and it truly was a team effort as they had four players score at least 10 points. 6'0 senior Koko Songolo was the leading scorer but, he really got the bulk of his points shooting free throws late. Wish I had more to say about Memorials game but, I don't recall a lot and there wasn't anything that impressive other then the pounding of the glass by Memorial, which has gotten to be the norm for Memorial.
Top Players
Quinten Shere 5'11 senior La Follette- Kind of street ball game with lots of dribbling and going to the hoop hard. Has that real nice floater in the lane and just plays extremely hard.
Henry Houden 6'3 senior Memorial- Just the ultimate glue player. Does a little bit of everything and really battles on the glass. Showed a real nice step back jumper from 15 feet.
Brett Tauber 6'5 senior Memorial- Another guy that really control the glass and the paint on the defensive end. Showed a nice offensive touch and even stepped out and hit a three point shot.
Box Score
MF- Shere 18 Cortez McCree 13 Thomas 6 David Turner 4 Tommy Green 3 Travell Ewing 2 Elias Sobah 1 Kian O'Brien 0 Tom Bartz 0
MM- Songolo 15 Houden 13 Tauber 12 Jake Ferguson 10 Travis Lindquist 5 Billy Wilson 3 Smith 0
It appears these two teams are going in the opposite direction. Memorial appears to be clicking at the right time and are my pick to win the Big Eight conference. La Follette just can't get things going at all and just can not consistently score and get beat on the offensive glass. Hopefully for La Follette's sake Thomas and company can get back on track.
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