Rock Falls 73 Mendota 55

I've written about Performance Ratings in the past and how we use them to evaluate a game. As a team against Mendota on Friday night we had a +91 performance rating. In my 9 years as a head coach that is one of the highest I've seen. That is good news considering the game we had just played at IVC on Tuesday night. For the night, Matt Lauts led with a +25 and Jake Junis was right behind with a +23. Lauts was our leading scorer with 18 points on 7 of 8 from the field and 4 of 4 from the FT line. He also had 6 rebounds. Junis added 12 points and 11 rebounds. Brett Chappell added 12 on four 3-PT FG.

We finally got out and scored some easy baskets in transition which is something we have been pleading with the kids to do more. Not only do we want to get out and run on a stop but also after a made basket. I think when we do so we get the defense on their heels immediately and it keeps us in attack mode. We also made 12 of 15 FT's for 80%.

Offensively, we've put a lot of pressure on kids to be harder to guard. We have not been cutting hard in our motion offense. That is one of many key components to this offense. I did see more hard cutters diving through the lane. Again, this puts pressure on the defense and takes some of the help away on dribble penetration. Now we have to start making good decisions on when to drive.

One negative on the night would be turning the ball over 16 times, 11 of which came in the first half. With a faster paced game will come a few more turnovers, but 11 in a half is just way too many. I thought our defense was solid again. Shay Brown continues to do a nice job out top pressuring the ball and getting deflections. He has really set the tone defensively. With Tevin Rumley back and providing a lift offensively, Dylan Austin has gone back to his quiet assassin role. That is, he just quietly goes about his business on the offensive end and takes advantage of the attention that Jake and Tevin receive. He has been very consistent for us of late.