How Brady Davidson is impacting Rock Bridge's success beyond just simply scoring

The Class 6, District 7 quarterfinal game between top-seeded Rock Bridge and eighth-seeded Smith-Cotton was briefly close before junior Brady Davidson seized momentum for the Bruins.

With Rock Bridge leading 7-5 early in the first quarter, three defensive rebounds by Davidson turned directly into baskets on the offensive end, which was complemented with a bucket himself shortly before time expired.

The 6-foot-6 forward’s momentum didn’t end there.

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Davidson opened up the second quarter with another rebound leading to another transition opportunity for Rock Bridge. While the initial shot missed, it was no one else but Davidson there underneath the basket to clean up the rebound while finishing for another bucket.

What was once just a two-point advantage swelled to a multi-possession advantage for Rock Bridge, fueled by the tenacity of Davidson.

“It’s kind of whenever you just get into the flow of the game, and you start to feel comfortable,” Davidson said. “That’s really whenever I feel like I start to play well. It’s whenever you really get the flow, and you just get to play freely.”

The Bruins defeated Smith-Cotton 79-41 in the quarterfinal round of Districts advancing to the semifinals on Saturday. It’s now the Bruins sixth-straight victory dating back to Feb. 10. It’s also the sixth-straight time the Bruins have held a team under the 50-point mark. Echoing his head coach Jim Scanlon, Davidson feels that it’s been a key to Rock Bridge’s success over the past 20-plus days.

“It’s easy to hold a team under 40 points and be able to win that game,” Davidson said. “So once our team gets rolling, we start to get confidence on the offensive side of the game.”

Davidson has helped drive that ship on the defensive side of the court. As a quarterback on the football field, he’s been able to apply the traits from the gridiron to help him flourish in all aspects.

“I really take the athletic ability, just being able to move a little bit and also just having the ability to see everything on the floor,” Davidson said. “I feel my vision really helps coming from football in reading the defense and to come into basketball and find open guys on back cuts and stuff like that.”

Davidson finished the contest with 10 points to go along with eight rebounds in the winning effort.

“He does a lot of things for us. He helps a lot on defense,” Scanlon said. “He’s the best talker we have on defense. He rebounds and that’s just kind of how he plays. He’s a little bit of everything.”

After the Bruins' victory over Battle on Feb. 19, Scanlon mentioned that Davidson is the team’s leader. Davidson humbly doesn’t feel he’s above anyone else and credits himself developing into a leader to his teammates around him.

“We’ve got a great group of guys and everybody has my back and so I get to really have that voice of the team that really gets to push everybody,” Davidson said. “We’re all in the same role, but the guys really listen to me and they’re really good and have a lot of trust in me.”

Davidson was one of three double-digit scorers against the Tigers. Swindle scored 10 points for the Bruins. Rock Bridge’s leading scorer was junior big man Reese Minnix, who tallied 17 points and zero fouls.

“He’s got a lot of talent, and he’s getting better,” said Scanlon on Minnix. “We talked the other day, look for shots and whatever. He’s a good player, and I think he kind of showed it tonight.”

Rock Bridge will face fourth-seeded Battle in a rematch the first time both teams met at Rock Bridge High School. The Bruins won the matchup 60-45. Battle defeated fifth-seeded Grain Valley 89-55 shortly after the Bruins victory.

Both teams will tip off at 5:30 p.m. at Blue Springs South High School in Blue Springs, Missouri. The winner of the two will face the victor of Hickman and Blue Springs, who play at 7 p.m. The Kewpies defeated Fort Osage in their quarterfinal matchup.

Scanlon is pleased with the Bruins play on Thursday, but like many other teams still in the dance he’s not satisfied just yet.

“I’m proud of our guys. They came out and played well,” Scanlon said. “But we got to get better on Saturday night.”

This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: How Brady Davidson is impacting Rock Bridge's success beyond just simply scoring