BANGOR TOWNSHIP, MI – They have nobody scoring more than 12 points per game and nobody pulling down more than eight rebounds.
They have nobody on fire, nobody tearing it up and nobody killing it.
But the Essexville Garber boys basketball team has found something that is working – working better every game. And the Dukes are finding that team-wide continuity is golden when you don’t have a go-to player.
“Actually, we have a lot of go-to players,” Garber senior Jameson VanOchten said. “We have 12 guys who can score and 12 guys who can rebound. And that makes every day in practice a blast.”
Using their winning formula – with multiple players stepping up at different points in the game but nobody ever taking command – the Dukes downed host John Glenn 51-30 in a matchup of first-round district foes.
Garber got 13 points and nine rebounds from VanOchten, 11 points from Dylan McFarlane, and nine points and nine rebounds from Evan Burrows. Adam Shimel scored seven points, Riley Day had four assists, Ben Davis four rebounds… Not a single stat jumps off the sheet, but they all add up to victory.
“It’s good that we got (the win), but what I really like is how we got it,” Garber coach Chris Watz said. “They’re starting to figure things out. If we actually do the things we’ve been talking about all year, it just might work.”
View Kaytie Boomer’s photo gallery from Garber at Glenn
Garber's senior Dylan McFarlane (10) guards John Glenn's junior Quincy Almond (12) in a game at John Glenn High School in Bay City on Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2020.Kaytie Boomer | MLive.com
Garber (10-8) certainly seems to have it figured out lately. After sitting at 5-7 and riding a four-game losing streak, the Dukes have rattled off five wins in their past six games, building a head of steam as the postseason approaches.
Last season, Garber finished the regular season 8-12 only to play their best ball in the second season to emerge as a surprise winner of the district championship.
“Our coach always says the regular season is important, but what we really want to do is have some momentum for March,” VanOchten said. “It does feel like we’ve turned a corner, and we’re going to be ready for the districts.”
As fate would have it, Garber hosts Glenn on March 9 in the district quarterfinal, adding an underlying twist to Tuesday’s matchup. The Bay County foes – who ratchet their rivalry up a notch next year when they become Tri-Valley Conference adversaries – likely wanted to send a message but didn’t want to give too much away.
What Garber revealed, however, is that it is a quickly improving team that is finding its identity. And that identity doesn’t involve a single player of the go-to variety.
“We have to spread it around and play unselfish to be successful,” Watz said. “Each guy kind of brings his own thing.”
That’s a brand of ball that isn’t always a hit among basketball players, but it is emerging as the style that suits this squad.
“Every team has the potential to play that way, but not every team does,” said VanOchten, who has helped the Dukes win the past three meetings with Glenn. “I’ve never been on a team with this kind of chemistry.”
Garber got scoring from six different sources to build a 22-19 lead at halftime. McFarlane, the senior shooting guard, took his cue to step it up in the decisive third quarter, knocking down three 3-pointers as the Dukes went on an 18-4 run.
Glenn (11-8) got 16 points from Jobe Long and six from Gabriel Wallaker. Remarkably, the Bobcats have alternated wins and losses the past nine games, neither winning nor losing two in a row since Jan. 24.
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February 26, 2020 at 10:15AM
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With 12 guys and a ball, Garber has all it needs to down John Glenn - mlive.com
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