ST. LOUIS — On Friday Chaminade varsity basketball (10-1) will visit Lutheran North (6-8), after stomping Marquette on Thursday night.
The Mustangs kept a tight game during the first 10 minutes of regulation on Thursday, but then Chaminade head coach Frank Bennett unleashed junior guard Damien Mayo Jr.
Mayo Jr. hit two slam dunks within a three-minute span in the first quarter, before Chaminade set up junior forward Tarris Reed Jr. for one of his own.
Although the red army can’t be present this year, the limited number of fans in the stands enjoyed Chaminade’s thrilling 73-58 victory over Marquette.
Chaminade’s only loss this season was to Vashon High School on Dec. 28. Since then, the team has scored at least 56 points in each of their wins.
Mayo Jr. and Reed Jr. have played a large part in that success with a combined 272 points on the season. Mayo Jr. is averaging more than 14 points per game, and Reed Jr. is averaging more than 19 points per game.
They’ll face a Lutheran North team on Friday that's had more of a struggle in 2021. The Crusaders are 2-5 since the new year began.
Lutheran North head basketball coach Gerald Jones said the focus moving forward is managing possessions with a purpose.
“I’m very optimistic,” Jones said. “I think I have a good, young group. We’re smaller of course, and so we’ve been dominated because of our size, but if we manage our possessions properly, it’ll keep us in the game. And again, every game is an opportunity for us to learn how to manage our possessions.”
Jones said the team graduated many talented seniors in 2020 but is confident in the future of the program and believes this team has the talent and ability to win the division if they make tangible changes each night.
“Minimizing our turnovers, taking the right shots, making the extra pass,” Jones said. “So if our kids can hear that, and they can hear it from somebody else and believe in it, I think we can be good in the end. Not only that, but learn from as many experiences as we can now to put ourselves in the position to be a champion in the near future.”
Tipoff is at 7 p.m.
