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Mustangs’ strong performance tames Lions

November 17, 2011
By Christian Campbell

On Friday night, the Mustangs men’s basketball team started their season off right by defeating the York Lions 78-60.

In the first quarter, the Mustangs came out red hot on offence, connecting on six three-pointers and shooting 68 per cent from the field.

On the other end, Western swarmed the ball on every possession and forced the Lions to commit multiple turnovers.

“They shot the heck out of the ball in the beginning and their pressure on our young guys may have rattled them a little bit. They hit shot after shot, and made some really tough ones where we were there with a hand in their face,” Tom Oliveri, Lions head coach, said.

“I give them a lot of credit for playing really well offensively and defensively for taking us out of what we were trying to do,” he continued.

Leading the way was veteran point guard Ryan Barbeau, who connected on three three-pointers and helped the Mustangs to a 28-10 first quarter lead. Barbeau finished the game with 22 points.

Heading into the second frame, the Lions looked to turn things around by using their size advantage to punish the Mustangs in the paint.

However, continuing their fast-paced offence and a swarming defence, the Mustangs kept the Lions off balance and forced them into multiple wasted offensive sets.

“To counteract our lack of size we have to get after it defensively. We did a great job of denying a lot of their entries so they couldn’t take advantage of their size down low. It was a lot of aggressive defence on our part,” Brad Campbell, Mustangs head coach, said.

This strategy was incredibly successful as the Mustangs held the Lions scoreless until 3:55 in the second quarter.

The Lions were not much more successful on defence as the Mustangs picked apart their 2-3 zone with crisp passing and effective three-point shooting. The Mustangs hit 10 shots from the land beyond in the first half.

Leading the way in the quarter for the Mustangs was guard Ryan Higgins.

Higgins connected on three three-pointers in the period. He was the Mustangs’ leading scorer on the night and finished with 24 points.

The lone bright spot for the Lions in the second quarter was the play of guard David Tyndale, who hit three-pointers on back-to-back possessions and prevented the Mustangs from extending the lead even further.

At the half, the Mustangs had built a sizeable 49-23 advantage.

However, the third quarter was a different story altogether.

The Lions began to take advantage of their size mismatch in the paint and were able to seemingly score at will.

On defence, the Lions used a combination of a full court press and their 2-3 zone to harass the Mustangs’ ball-carriers and force multiple turnovers which led to fast-break points.

“I think we had a big letdown in the third quarter. Our defence got less aggressive and sloppy and we just couldn’t match their intensity level,” Campbell said.

The Lions returned the favour for what the Mustangs had done to them in the first quarter by outscoring them 28-10 in the third.

By quarter’s end the score was 59-51, putting the Lions right back in the game.

Both teams came out with a high level of intensity on defence to start the fourth quarter.

The Lions continued their strong play and the Mustangs rotated and gave better help, which prevented the Lions from easily getting the ball inside to their big men.

“We had a talk and increased our energy in the fourth.  It was mostly on the defensive end where we were getting killed. It was us as a team just having to come together and tough it out,” Ryan Higgins, Mustangs guard, said.

The two teams played each other to a standstill in the opening minutes, with neither able to establish their offence.

The turning point for the Mustangs came on two big plays made by point guard Ryan Barbeau and forward Peter Scholtes.

Barbeau drove inside and hit a tough fade-away jumper to push the lead to 12 with eight minutes left and then on the next possession Scholtes looked off two defenders and dished the ball inside to forward Quinn Henderson for another two.

“We got up to a big lead and we knew at one point they were going to make a run, so we just had to understand that and refocus when it happened. We just had to adjust after that third period and come out strong again in the fourth,” Henderson said.

Western never looked back from there and won the game 78-60.

The Mustangs are now 1-1 on the season, after they lost their next match in the dying seconds of the game to Laurentian.

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