Madison Memorial #1 alone

Madison Memorial is now alone in first place of the Big Eight conference. I stated in a post a couple weeks ago that the chips just seem to fall Memorial's way. They defeated Middleton on Thursday night to go up a game on them and with Madison East losing Memorial is alone on top. Things also goes Memorial's way as I heard in the stands the East's star Deang Deang is out for the remainder of the year with a broken foot. Memorial has also played the top teams in the conference already and only have teams in the bottom half of the conference remaining.

Memorial started off extremely rough early on and Middleton wasn't great but, they were able to make a three here and there and were getting some offensive rebounds for second chance buckets. Middleton was up 11 to 5 after one quarter and Memorial was lucky to be that close as Middleton couldn't convert on some wide open shots. Throughout the first three quarters Memorial missed a ton of free throws, didn't hit any outside shots, and struggled at the line but, in the second quarter Memorial got their transition game going and turned the D up a bit forcing some turnovers and tied the game up at 19 a piece at half time.

In the second half Memorial went extremely cold as they were missing bunnies and three's and scored only three points in the third quarter and were down 31-22 at the end of three. Middleton just could never put Memorial away and in the fourth quarter it came back to bite them. Memorial star 5'10 Shareef Smith got his game going driving to the rim and finishing or creating contact and getting to the line in leading Memorial to 27 fourth quarter points after only mustering the 22 prior to the fourth. When Smith wasn't scoring Memorial was able to get second and third chances at the bucket and when you give any team that many chances they are going to eventually score. Middleton's defense just wasn't their tonight and when you shoot as many threes as Middleton does your going to live at times and die other times Memorial actually ended up winning with Middleton having to foul late in this one, 49-40. Memorial outscored Middleton 27-9 in the fourth.

Top players 
Shareef Smith 5'10 senior Madison Memorial- Finally had the game I thought he would have all year long. He was able to drive to the lane at will and finish at the rim and was the only real outside threat for Memorial. Smith is just so quick pushing the tempo and getting easy buckets for himself and team mates. Handles the ball very well.

Henry Houden 6'3 senior Madison Memorial- Think I say it every time I see Memorial play but, he is their glue guy holding things together and being the team leader. Just dominated on the glass tonight tip shots in on the offensive end and also showed the ability to drive to the lane and score.

Storm Murphy 5'9 sophomore Middleton- Very good point guard that just does his job distributing the ball and can knock down the three or get to the rim and score when needed.

Ian Hokanson 6'4 senior Middleton- Love how he competes with so much energy rebounding and defending in the lane. At time's he keeps them in the game with his energy. Has the ability to hit the outside shot when he can set his feet.

Box Score
MM- Smith 24 Houden 14 Koko Songolo 6 Brett Tauber 4 Jason Weah 1 Jake Ferguson 0 Billy Wilson 0
Midd- Hokanson 10 Murphy 9 CJ Fermanich 7 Tyree Eady 7 Cam Maly 3 Cody Markel 2 Andrew Gardner 2 Kellanb Schulz 0 Tyler Ballweg 0 Brett Joers 0 Jordan Smith 0 Brady Thomas 0 Mitch Bacon 0

Things are really looking up for Madison Memorial as I've been saying but, they really need to pick their game up if they want to make another state run and beat some of the better teams. I just don't know how I feel about this Middleton team.They shoot a ton of threes which allows them to beat some teams but, that also allows them to lose to some teams they shouldn't. Also they sub so much and not sure how I feel about that. It allows them to play extremely hard for two to three minutes but, just feel like it would be hard to find a rhythm.