In its last home game of the season, Muncie Burris High School (8-12, 1-3 Pioneer) defeated Blue River Valley High School (12-10, 3-7 Mid-Eastern) 66-51.
“This is probably our best effort as a team, defensively, start to finish,” Muncie Burris head coach John Donahue said. “We challenged the guys to put together two strong halves of basketball tonight. I think, for the most part, they stepped up and did that. It wasn’t a perfect game, but, as a coach, I’m pretty happy.”
Burris had the lead for most of the game, taking an 11-9 lead with 3:30 left in the first quarter, and never looked back. The Owls outscored the Vikings in every quarter. Donahue attributes that to Burris’ newfound focus on defense.
“We put such a big emphasis on defense, and for us to play defense the way we did tonight, I couldn’t be more proud,” Donahue said. “We came out in the third quarter with a great defensive effort. We got a few stops, got some momentum going our way, and really gave some belief to our boys that we can come out strong.”
Burris’ offensive attack was led by junior guard Colin McBride, who came away with 24 points and grabbed five rebounds. McBride said his teammates were key to his scoring, taking the focus away from him.
“My teammates started off hot, and I didn’t,” McBride said. “[Blue River Valley] started focusing more on them. Once I started warming up, it was easy for me to get open looks because of penetration.”
Junior forward Carter Fisher scored 18 points and added in eight rebounds. Sophomore forward Ethan Hartsook hit some crucial shots and ended with seven points. Junior guard Bryce Karnes had six points, four of which came on back-to-back fastbreak layups in the third quarter to help push Burris’ lead.
“In the first half, we were able to get a lot of dribble penetration,” Donahue said. “In the second half, we wanted to sort of get away from that. We wanted to get into the flow of our offense, really challenge [Blue River Valley] to play defense. I think we found success offensively through that.”
For Blue River Valley, senior forward Brevin Hallatt led the way with a game-high 25 points to go along with seven rebounds. Hallatt had 25 of the Vikings’ 51 points by himself. Junior guard Wyatt Thornburgh was held to nine points, while junior guard Brian Walradth added five points and six rebounds.
“I told the kids, ‘We came ready for a basketball game, and they came ready for a fight,’” Blue River Valley head coach Brian Klein said. “This is a different basketball team than they were a month and a half ago. [Muncie Burris] was tougher than us from the tip. 50-50 balls, controlling the glass, they had all the effort plays. From opening tip to final bell, they were the tougher team.”
With this win, the Owls are on a four-game winning streak and are 5-2 since Donahue took over as coach. McBride said that the new coaches have made Muncie Burris a new team.
“We struggled early in the year, so this feels good,” McBride said. “We started getting more fan support from the students, so it’s nice to play well in front of them. When these new coaches came in, we started putting our emphasis on defense, you can tell with our win streak. We’re an offensively gifted team, so defense is what we should be working on, and we’ve been playing well.
Muncie Burris has one more regular-season game, on the road against Blackford Thursday, Feb 24 at 7:30 p.m. After that, the Owls will head to New Castle to play in the Class 3A Sectional 24. Burris will play the winner of Delta/Yorktown. With its regular season finished, Blue River Valley will host the Class 1A Sectional 56, where it will play Union City Tuesday, March 1 at 6 p.m.
Contact Nate Grubb with comments at nathaniel.grubb@bsu.edu or on Twitter @GrubbNate43
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