Eagles start slowly, break away in second quarter to down Brookside
Avon certainly used its superior height and depth Saturday to defeat host Brookside in a non-conference boys basketball matchup, but it wasn’t until they got a reminder of who they are that the Eagles were able to pull away for a 72-43 victory. Avon, 5-2, never trailed in winning its fourth consecutive game, but the Eagles also never led by more than eight points until midway through the second quarter, when coach Mike Fitch called a timeout. “Honestly, we weren’t ready to go in the first quarter,” Fitch said. “We don’t play defense like that. We gave up 20 points in the first, I don’t know, nine minutes. I called a timeout, and then they ended up only scoring a couple in the rest of the second quarter. Defensively, we really picked it up.” That’s putting it mildly. Sitting on a 27-21 advantage with 4:51 left in the second period, the Eagles went on a 15-0 run that was fueled by Shane Carty, who came off the bench to score eight of his 11 points. The halftime margin was 42-24, but Avon continued its dominance in the third quarter, completing a 13-4 run to make it 55-28 at the 2:00 mark. Thus, the Eagles outscored Brookside, 28-7, in a span of just under 11 minutes. “We knew we started off slow,” said senior guard Gavyn Kittelberger. “We had trouble guarding on-ball, but we knew we had to take it to another level. We had a bad practice the day before, so we just knew that we had to come out strong and play hard on-ball defense.” Kittelberger played a major role in Avon’s breakaway, successfully attacking the basket while also coming up with some key defensive plays. “He was getting downhill and he was getting those steals,” said Fitch. “He’s getting hands to the ball. He’s really good. Sometimes he loses his guys defensively, but he was in those passing lanes and he was physical.” When asked about his role in helping break open the game, Kittelberger replied, “I just knew I’m a key part of the team to be able to step up and do little things to help us pull away. It gave us an extra boost. It helped us build on the lead and just go after it.” Kittelberger tied Brooks Good for team scoring honors with 14 points each. Carty and Joey Ziegler each added 11 points, and Preston Johnson had eight off the bench. The Eagles also connected on nine 3-pointers, with six different players hitting from beyond the arc. “We needed to focus on getting downhill,” Fitch said of his team’s slow start. “I think we were settling a little bit for outside shots, and we needed to focus and get downhill. Then we knocked some down.” The other positive aspect to the dominant performance for Avon was rebounding. The Eagles have perhaps the tallest team in the area, and they used that size to control the boards, pulling down 19 offensive rebounds on the way to enjoying a rebounding advantage of 20. “Obviously, our length is huge against a smaller school, but they had a lot of guys going after it,” said Fitch. “We talked about one of our goals being offensive rebounds, so it’s awesome to hear that.” Avon returns to Southwestern Conference play Tuesday when it travels to Midview.
