Despite cold temperatures and falling snow outside of the Mingus Union High School gym, its boys basketball team had hot shooting hands.
The Marauders [12-14, 4-4 4A Grand Canyon] jumped on visiting Bradshaw Mountain High School early in a battle between the fourth and fifth placed teams in the section on Jan. 24, coming away 68-49 victors.
Mingus pressured defensively and, according to head coach, Dave Beery, the Bears’ defensive plan invited his team to shoot the ball.
“Our team’s a pretty good shooting team, we can shoot the ball if you give us open looks,” Beery said. “If teams want to dare us to shoot, we’re game for that.”
The Marauders perimeter shooters proved that, as five different shooters sank five buckets from distance in the first quarter. Bradshaw Mountain had taken an early lead at 3-2, but Mingus’ shooting put the visitors in a 21-9 hole.
Defensively, the Marauders played up-tempo, collecting turnovers and deflections to either score points in transition or gain extra possessions. Beery said that it was a point of emphasis after collecting only three steals and four transition points in the teams’ first matchup on Dec. 16.
Mingus was forced to forfeit that game due to an ineligible player.
“The defense we run, as soon as they pick it up, you know you’ve got to jump those gaps,” senior guard Chase Paquin said. “I think that’s what we really did a good job of was jumping the gaps …. As soon as they got nervous, they kind of threw it to get away with it.”
Five more triples and four points off eight turnovers pushed the Marauders’ lead to 44-24 at halftime.
“They just kept collapsing everyone in the paint, so the open kickouts were wide open,” Paquin said. “We were just hitting shots, we found our good shooters, we didn’t have too many bad shots.”
A few of those bad shots came at the outset of the second half, and the Bears went on a 11-2 run that forced Beery into taking a timeout.
Paquin said that the team had the mentality that it had already won it, being up so much by halftime, and it was a lead that it had given up before.
“We came out and we weren’t ready to play, and so we took a couple of selfish, poor shots…,” Beery said. “The ball kind of went to one side of the court and stayed there, and we made it easy for them to play defense, and then we made it easier by having a few bad shots and turnovers.”
The Marauders recovered and struck from beyond the arc four times, including three straight, to round out the quarter with a 60-37 lead.
Paquin stole the ball and went coast to coast in the first possession of the fourth. Later on, junior forward Michael Bryan made a clean block that led to the final two Marauders points off of a transition bucket for senior guard Isaac Escalante.
Escalante score a game-high 18 points, and Paquin and Bryan each netted three three-pointers. Mingus shot 15 for 29 from distance and 27 for 49 total.
The Marauders lost 66-54 at Mohave High School Thursday, Jan. 26, in a game originally scheduled for Jan. 21.
On Friday, Jan. 27, MUHS hosted senior night against Coconino High School. Marauders seniors Paquin, Escalante, Victor Anaya, Jordan Pollock, Scott Wilson and Miles Tapija were honored. The team won 75-55.
Mingus played on Tuesday Jan. 31 at Flagstaff High School, but results were not available at press time. It rounds out the regular season at 7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 3 at Lee Williams High School.
