BASKETBALL: Hornets, Pioneers beat up on Indians
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[The Du Quoin Indians have now dropped four of their last five games after weekend losses to conference foe Nashville on Friday, then to a talented Trico squad that came out of Saturday's meeting with a record of 14-3.
The Hornets' dominated the 49-31 contest at Nashville High School, and with the win moved into sole possession of second place in the Southern Illinois River-to-River Conference Mississippi Division with a record of 4-1, leaving the Indians in third at 3-2.
"That's just one of those games it felt like we got beat in every aspect of the game," said Indians' head coach Gabe Sveda. "We've just got to knock some shots down. We went on a big drought there in the second quarter."
Brenden Fred was left open for a buzzer-beating three-pointer to end the first quarter with Du Quoin up 11-9, and the Indians led 15-11 in the second after a stick-back bucket by Brandon Williams.
From that point on, the Hornets took over with an 11-1 run to close out the half with a six-point lead. Du Quoin briefly got within two at the start of the third quarter, but an 8-0 Hornets run followed that proved to be the backbreaker.
The Indians shot just 11-of-37 (30%) from the floor in the game.
Fred's 10 points led Du Quoin, John Galik added 7, Williams 4, Nate Boss and Cayle Diggins 3, Dillon Beltz and Austin Mansker 2. Devin Holle led the Hornets with 12 points.
Twenty-four hours later, Du Quoin was taking on a well-rested Trico team at their place, and seemed to wear down in the later moments of a 52-36 defeat.
"That's a nice ball club, give them credit," said Sveda of the Pioneers. "They executed for four quarters."
"There were times we had lulls in our offense, couldn't score a few times there in the second quarter, there in the third quarter. Some shots didn't fall, but our kids gave a good effort and followed the game plan tonight, I'm proud of them for that."
The Indians' game plan in the first half appeared to be to ride the hot hand of Galik. The senior guard had 13 first-half points while Du Quoin's defense held Trico's post presence Chase Heins to just 4 points in the first two periods with some defensive adjustments.
"We thought there were a couple of kids we could double off of, and Brenden Fred did a really nice job," Sveda said. "We wanted to double away from the ball on the weak side and it was effective."
The Indians led 23-22 at the half and 28-26 after Galik added to his totals with a two-pointer with 5:28 left in the third, but the Pioneers rallied to score the last eight points of the period and seize control of the game.
"We came out in the third quarter and the first couple minutes were pretty good," Sveda said, "then we got another lull again."
"We couldn't score, then they went down and we took a couple possessions off I thought on the defensive end. We didn't take off many tonight, but we took off just enough for them to make a run there in the third quarter and that was the difference in the ball game."
By the time the run ended, Trico had scored fourteen unanswered points and led 40-28 with just six minutes left in the contest and Du Quoin got no closer than nine down the rest of the way.
Galik finished with 23 points to lead all scorers, Williams added 6, Jon Boss 3, Diggins and Fred each with 2. Daron Meyerhoff scored 15 points to lead Trico (14-3), Heins added 12.
Du Quoin (7-9, 3-2) heads to Sparta on Wednesday where they will meet Murphysboro at 8:30 p.m. in the 48th Annual Sparta Mid-Winter Classic.