Hot start lifts Morris to win over Coal City

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COAL CITY -- Both Coal City and Morris came into Tuesday night's nonconference boys basketball meeting needing a victory. Both had struggled in the season's first month-and-a-half and both wanted to get the new calendar year off to a good start.

Morris (3-8) got what it wanted while the host Coalers (1-13) were left still looking for answers. The visiting Redskins swooped into Coal City, jumped out to a 14-0 lead in the first 5 minutes and never looked back on their way to a 60-28 victory.

"We know that our (Southwest Prairie) Conference is going to be a bear this year," Morris coach Joe Blumberg said, "and league wins will not be easy to get. I have to give our kids credit for keeping a good attitude despite our early season record. They continue to be positive and unselfish and it showed with the way we came out to play tonight."

Morris did absolutely nothing wrong in the first quarter. The Redskins pounced on Coal City and forced turnovers on six of the Coalers' first eight possessions. Morris sank 7-of 13 shots, including 2-of-3 from 3-point range, and found itself ahead 14-0 with 2:59 left and 16-3 at the end of the quarter. The game, for all intents and purposes, was already over as the outmanned Coalers never got within 13 points the rest of the way.

Morris pushed the margin to 32-13 at halftime. The Redskins forced 10 first-half Coal City turnovers and outrebounded the Coalers 15-7 in the opening half.

Despite the one-sidedness of the game, Morris did not get sloppy in the second half. The Redskins committed just 1 turnover, forced 5 more, and continued to shoot well. For the game, Morris shot 47.9 percent (23-of-48).

"I was really pleased with our overall play tonight," said Blumberg, a veteran Morris coach now in his second year in charge of the varsity program. "I thought we had great scoring balance, handled the ball well and executed our offense as well as we have all year.

"We continually preach execution to our kids in practice and tonight they showed that they were listening.

"We knew that Coal City was a little shorthanded (missing two players, including its starting point guard) but I told the kids before the game that we cannot let that affect how we play basketball. We still had to come out with a purpose and with a high level of intensity and that is exactly what we did."

The balance for Morris was very evident in the final statistics. No Redskin scored in double figures but two players had 9 points and two more had 8. Center Kevin Henry and guard Zack Flood each finished 1 point shy of the double-digit mark and Kjeld Torkelson and David Martino each collected 8.

Junior forward Mark Evans led the Coalers with 9 points, while sophomore forward Brian Suhling added 7 and a team-best 6 rebounds.

"We got off to a lackadaisical start and they capitalized on that with a near-perfect start," Coal City coach Chris Spencer said. "I have to give Morris a lot of credit. They shot very well in the first quarter especially and put us in a deep hole.

"I was proud of the way that our kids fought in the second half," continued Spencer, in his fifth year as the Coalers' varsity coach. "We battled all the way to the end.

"We have a lot of learning to do, but I am sure we will take some steps toward improvement as we get back into the I-8 (Interstate Eight Conference) schedule."