Big second half propels Union City past Quincy in Big 8 boys action

QUINCY - A big second half buoyed by a suffocating pressure defense and a dominant rebounding advantage propelled the Union City Chargers past Big 8 conference rival Quincy Tuesday night, with Union City taking the 42-30 win.

“First you have to give Quincy a lot of credit, they have really just gotten better as the season has gone along,” Union City coach Ben Chard said. “We came in with matching records really, as every team we had beaten they had beaten, so it was an evenly matched contest coming in. We knew it was going to be a dogfight and going into the half we felt pretty good, we made a little push to end the half and really hunkered down on defense and on the boards to put away the win in the second half.”

Union City improves to 8-4 overall on the season with the win and 4-1 in the Big 8 conference. The Chargers will next see action Friday when they host Concord.

“I just thought we were a little flat tonight, it just didn’t seem like we had the energy or the desire that we normally have,” Quincy coach Scott Rodesiler said. “We came out like we were still frozen from this weather, like we had not thawed out yet. Credit Union City, they came out and wanted it just a little more.”

Quincy falls to 7-5 overall on the season and 2-3 in the Big 8 conference. The Orioles will be back in action Friday when they travel to Springport.

What Happened?

With the game tied at 8-8 after one quarter, the margin remained razor thin going into the half, with Union City holding on to the 18-15 advantage.

Union City came out of the half employing an extremely aggressive and suffocating full court pressure that kept the Orioles on their toes, leading to a handful of turnovers, which in turn led to Union City buckets.

That, combined with a dominant effort in the paint and on the boards, especially by Union City junior Aidan Decker, allowed the Chargers to outscore Quincy 15-9 in the third quarter to build a 33-24 lead after three quarters.

Union City withstood an early Quincy barrage, led by a pair of triples from Grant Carter, as the Chargers regained their footing and control of the contest.

Union City went on to outscore Quincy 9-6 in the fourth quarter to find the final score of 42-30.

Statistical Leaders

Union City’s effort was led by two double digit scorers and another two just missing double digits. The Chargers were led by Eli Payne who had 12 points while Decker added a dominant double-double with 10 points and 15 rebounds, seven of which came on the offensive glass.

Also scoring for the Chargers was Jeremy Zehr with nine points and Rick Austin with eight points.

Quincy had one player hit double digits as Grant Carter scored 12 points to go along with five rebounds.

Also adding to the Oriole effort was Brandon Miner with six points and five rebounds while Alex Dunn pulled in a team high eight rebounds.

They Said It

“I wish I knew what happened tonight, if I could figure it out I would bottle the remedy and sell it and be a millionaire. I don’t want to say it has anything to do with not going to school or messing up the schedule, but that just sounds like an excuse to me. Union City was in the same boat as us with missing school, and they came out with the energy and effort, so I do not know what happened. I am not saying the guys did not try tonight, it just seems like we were going through the motions with no energy. Sometimes in sports you have a game where you are just flat and you do not know why. We just did not do enough, we were just a little bit slow in a lot of ways. I do not blame the team completely, it is on me to get the team prepared and ready to play, so that’s on me as well. I still think we are a very good team, there is no reason to hit the panic button, we just need to get back to what we were doing early in the season and get back to work.” - Quincy coach Scott Rodesiler

“Obviously coming over to Quincy, it is going to be tough because this is one of the toughest places to play in the Big 8. At the half I told the guys that we needed to hunker down on defense and we created a couple of turnovers early and we continued rebounding. (Grant) Carter hit a couple of big three pointers to keep them in the game but we regrouped and closed out on him on defense, then we finished things out with some big box outs and some great ball handling to get the win.” - Union City coach Ben Chard.

More: Quincy boys basketball takes two wins on the week

Quincy takes JV win over Union City

The Quincy JV Orioles started the night out with a win, defeating Union City by the score of 44-35.

The game was a back-and-forth contest, with Quincy holding a slim 22-20 lead at the half. Quincy’s Braylon Estlow hit some big buckets after the break to allow the JV Orioles to pull away for the win.

Quincy was led by Estlow with 16 points and four steals while Brennan Morrell added 12 points and nine rebounds.

This article originally appeared on Coldwater Daily Reporter: Big second half propels Union City past Quincy in Big 8 boys action