Times No. 7 Wheeler dominates Marquette

UNION TWP. | Defensively, Times No. 7 Wheeler is solid.

Offensively, coach Mike Jones believes the Bearcats have a little bit of work to do even after blasting Michigan City Marquette 81-34 Tuesday night in a Greater South Shore Conference matchup.

Wheeler (5-1, 3-0) forced 31 Blazers turnovers, including 20 steals, and took the mystery out of this one early by sprinting out to a 16-0 lead less than four minutes into the game.

"The first six games we've played pretty good defense," Jones said. "It allows us to get out in transition and get easy baskets.

"We're not shooting as well as I think we can, but the defense helps."

Junior forward Najee Bailey led the Bearcats with 20 points in less than three quarters of action. Andrew Rudakas (13 points, 11 rebounds), Petar Todorovic (13 points, seven assists, five steals) and Aleksa Kojcinovic (12 points, seven rebounds) also put up big numbers.

Point guard Donnie Ketchum played a solid game, scoring nine points to go along with three assists and four steals.

But Jones wasn't overly pleased with a 32-for-79 (40.5 percent) shooting performance, as the Bearcats missed several easy inside shot attempts.

"We've got some guys who are capable of shooting the ball and shooting the ball well," Jones said. "We've put in a lot of time at working on defense, and maybe that's affected our offense.

"But we missed a lot of shots that you need to make in the tight games."

This one was anything but tight. The Blazers (3-3, 1-2) put up little resistance, and trailed by 50 early in the fourth quarter.

Marquette coach Jason Hawkins, a former Valparaiso University player like Jones, said it was a bad time to play Wheeler which was coming off a loss to Andrean.

"Wheeler is a good team that plays hard," Hawkins said. "They're coming off a loss, ranked seventh in the state, have good senior leadership and they're well-coached.

"It was a bad night for us."

Joey Prybrylinski led Marquette with 14 points and six rebounds.

BOYS BASKETBALL

No. 7 Wheeler 81, M.C. Marquette 34

Najee Bailey scored a game-high 20 points for the Bearcats.