BASKETBALL: Indians dominate Cairo, Fred scores 27
DU QUOIN, IL - Just eighteen days after the last high school football game of his career, Du Quoin's three-sport star Brenden Fred began his senior basketball season with a 27-point performance as the Indians blew past Cairo 72-45 on day one of the 15th Annual Tip-Off Classic at Anders Gymnasium.
"What an incredible kid," said Indians head coach Gabe Sveda. "(Fred)'s a great kid overall, not just a good basketball player like he showed tonight."
"He can do so many things for you. He can handle the ball, he can score outside, he can score inside. He's got great post moves. A lot of that came off of effort, getting to the glass, he had somewhere around 15 rebounds."
Back-to-back three-pointers by Austin Mapps and Austin Mansker sparked a 16-3 run for Du Quoin in the opening quarter. Mansker also fed Daulton Donoghue for a pair of fast-break layups during the run which was capped off by Fred's stick-back with 3:15 to go in the period.
Fred showed off his quarterback skills on the final play of the first, firing a three-quarter court strike to Mapps for a buzzer-beating layup and a 21-12 lead.
"I thought we stepped up to the speed of the game," said Sveda. "I thought we were definitely there for all four quarters. We've got to do a little better job of running our offense sometimes, and waiting on screens, things like that. That's going to come with a little more work. I thought we answered as far as the energy, I thought we answered their intensity."
Fred added six points during a 14-2 run to end the half for Du Quoin, sinking a deep two from the corner off an inbounds play with 1.3 seconds on the clock to give the Indians a 41-19 halftime edge over the Pilots, who struggled to find consistent looks at the basket during the opening sixteen minutes.
Cairo got within sixteen of the Indians in the second half, but no closer. Fred, who had 10 points in the second quarter, scored 8 in the fourth and finished 6-for-6 at the free throw line.
"I thought we did a good job of playing team basketball tonight," Sveda said. "We've been working on that from day one, running our fast break and our secondary break, spreading the court. We can still do a lot better job of our spacing on that, but I thought overall it was a great team effort."
"I think at one point we had 15 field goals and 12 assists to go with those 15 field goals. This senior bunch has always been like that, they're very unselfish, they play really good team ball."
Daulton Beltz joined Fred in double figures with 11 points. Mansker and Deeja Cole each added 9 points, Mapps and Donoghue 7 and Spencer Cook 2.
Terion Taylor led the Pilots with 14 points.
The Tip-Off Classic resumes on Friday with Vandalia (0-1) taking on Cairo (0-1) at 6:00 p.m. and Flora (1-0) meeting Du Quoin (1-0) at 7:30. On Saturday, Cairo and Flora play at 6:00 p.m., Du Quoin vs. Vandalia at 7:30.
Flora defeated Vandalia 50-43 in the 6:00 p.m. game on Wednesday.