The way Jauwan Scaife describes his time on the court sounds more like a family barbecue than a hunt for one of five potential byes in the Mid-American Conference Tournament.
“I’m just out there playing, having a good time,” Scaife said with a smile. “I don’t think [on the court]. I’m just trying to be aggressive.”
During the latter half of the MAC season, the senior guard has played so well, he’s turning good performances into merely the expectation.
On Saturday, the Muncie native delivered once again.
For the fifth time in the last six games, Scaife scored over 20 points to lead Ball State (13-14, 6-8 MAC) to a crucial 86-72 win at Toledo (13-13, 8-6 MAC) as tournament seeding remains up for grabs.
“He’s not the player of the year in this league, there’s no question he’s not,” coach Tod Kowalczyk said. “But there’s no one playing better than him right now down the stretch.”
Whether Kowalcyzk meant Scaife’s current six-game scoring tear or Saturday’s final six-plus minutes, his statement applies.
The 6-foot, 2-inch sharpshooter scored 10 of his game-high 28 points in the final 6:04 to close out the Rockets for the Cardinals third consecutive win.
In arguably Ball State’s best performance of the season, however, Scaife had some help.
Junior guard Jesse Berry chipped in 22 points himself, including five 3-pointers, to help drive the team’s 15-3 run to end the game.
“It might not look like it, but Jauwan Scaife is still human,” Berry said. “That’s just what I’m here for. I just want to stay ready, so when Jauwan does have that game [where he struggles], there’s someone else to pick him up.”
Berry was speaking hypothetically, of course, seeing as Scaife shot 50 percent from the field (8-of-16) and 3-point range (5-of-10).
Nonetheless, Berry and the rest of the Cardinals picked up their game as a whole.
Junior forward Chris Bond scored 16 points, Ball State posted a plus-20 rebounding margin and the team shot over 50 percent from the field for the second straight game.
“It’s a huge game for us because we’ve been playing well and we’ve been doing a lot of good things on the practice floor,” coach Billy Taylor said. “Now we’ve got a little bit of a streak going. We’ve got confidence, we’ve got rhythm and I love the confidence I see in our players right now.”
Perhaps Taylor’s only complaint about Saturday’s game could be overconfidence by some of the players.
With Toledo down eight points and on defense with 2:17 remaining in the game, Berry pulled up from long range in transition and hit a 3-pointer. It effectively closed out the game, but Ball State was only seconds into its shot clock.
“Jesse gets into the zone and starts feeling it, and I almost had to run on the floor to not shoot the last one [under two minutes],” Taylor said. “But he’s such a threat and having him back out there and feeling good about himself [is important].”
After a rocky first five-plus minutes put the Cardinals in a 17-10 hole, the team found its confidence andresponded by tying the game at 19 by the 11:00 mark of the first half.
Ball State controlled the rest of the half, playing with seemingly more energy and effort.
The second half started the same way with the Cardinals playing tremendous help-and-recover defense that took the Rockets’ offense out of rhythm.
“I thought our defense was very good in the second half,” Taylor said. “It was really stingy, we had a lot of activity on the ball screens. We wanted to get them to play more isolation basketball and then we were able to make a crowd of defenders.”
Ball State did just that, leading most of the second half as well until Toledo made a run with 10 minutes left.
A layup by junior guard Rian Pearson with 8:03 remaining cut the Ball State lead to five points, but the Cardinals answered.
With the shot clock winding down, junior forward Matt Kamieniecki drove from the perimeter and missed a layup before outhustling every player for the rebound and putback.
Scaife and Berry took over from there, closing out the game with huge 3-pointers and clutch free throws.
“We just played great today,” Berry said. “Everything was falling, Jauwan was hitting everything, Matt beat up the glass like he usually does—everyone did their role today.”
Ball State’s win gives them a mathematical shot to still earn a fifth-seed and bye straight to Cleveland, Ohio for the site of the MAC Tournament semifinals.
The team still has games at Western Michigan and Northern Illinois at home before the first round begins, but the team gained at least one fan in Toledo on Saturday as the Rockets fight to win the MAC West Division title.
“If they play even close to that, they’re winning at Western,” Kowalczyk said after the game. “If they play like this, they’re going to win some more. I hope they do, I’m rooting for them.”
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