The Jays' blueprint

From the Lancaster Sunday News:

The Jays' blueprint

In college basketball, victories don't happen in just 40 minutes. Here's how Elizabethtown scouted and put together the game plan that resulted in last Wednesday's crucial win over Lycoming.

Sunday News
Published: Feb 15, 200900:17 EST
Elizabethtown

By GORDIE JONES, Correspondent

The end result came on Wednesday night, when Elizabethtown — playing as if its season depended on it (because, well, it did) — pounded Lycoming, 76-56.

Untold time and energy went into it. Time spent scouting, drilling and scheming. Energy expended on ego massaging, educated guessing and finger-crossing. And all within the confines of the practice-practice-game rhythm of the season, where there are other opponents to confront, other matters to consider.

The Sunday News examined the manner in which the Blue Jays, fighting for a Commonwealth Conference playoff spot, prepared for this game against the Warriors, which came at a critical point in E-town's season.

Losers of three straight — all in the conference, all by four points or fewer — the Jays began the night 4-5 in league play (and 10-11 overall), leaving them in fifth place, a half-game behind the Warriors (11-9, 4-4), with three games left. Only the top four teams qualify for the Commonwealth playoffs.

Here's what led up to it:

Thursday, Jan. 29, Grantham
Brad Karli, seated in the stands in Messiah College's gym, does not expect to learn too much about the Warriors — who on this night are facing the host Falcons — that he doesn't already know. That's because E-town has already seen Lycoming, having beaten them 68-61 on Jan. 7 in Williamsport.

It's also because he still has a copy of the seven-page scouting report compiled weeks before by Marty Hasenfuss, the former high school coach who scouts for the Jays.

And the truth is, Karli is just as interested in what Messiah is doing, since E-town will visit the Falcons the following Tuesday. Where the Warriors are concerned, he might pick up a new set play, a new substitution pattern, a new tendency or two — especially since their coach, Guy Rancourt, is in his first year.

The 32-year-old Karli, a Cedar Crest graduate, played point guard at E-town, ending in 1998. He has been part of Bob Schlosser's staff ever since. He admits that he aspires to be a head coach someday, that Division I holds a particularly strong allure — "the different type of kids you recruit, the different type of play, and with that, the pressure."

But that's a down-the-road ambition. On this night he watches Messiah jump out to an early lead. Then Lycoming guard Eric Anthony comes off a screen and buries a 3-pointer from the right wing.

"That's what he does well," Karli says.

Anthony began the night averaging 16.8 points a game. The Warriors' only other double-figure scorer is Greg Sye (13.8), a bruising forward.

But Sye, Anthony and everyone else shuttle in and out of the game, as Rancourt makes liberal use of his bench.

"He didn't sub like this when he played us," Karli says. "Some of these guys, I just don't remember."

The Falcons continue to build their lead. It is obvious that Anthony is, as Karli says, "all left hand." That neither he nor Sye are great defenders.

But really, nobody's having a good night for the Warriors, who trail 34-17 at the half.

They do no better after the break. With 4:23 left Messiah has built a 58-37 advantage, en route to a 75-53 victory.

Karli puts his notes away. One thing is sure, he says: "They'll never play this bad against us."

Tuesday, Feb. 10, Thompson Gym, Elizabethtown
Schlosser, standing at midcourt, has been watching his team practice baseline inbounds plays for over four minutes.

"And," he says, "Blue doesn't have a basket yet."

That team, comprised of the E-town starters, takes a break moments later.

When another group scores, he turns toward the regulars and pointedly says, "Pretty good, huh?"

He is 54 and in his 19th year as Jays coach, but remains the competitor he was, growing up in Tamaqua and playing point guard at Marian Catholic and East Stroudsburg. His teams, it seems, always play hard.

This particular one hasn't won lately, though. Its three-game skid started with a 69-65 overtime loss to Albright, and continued with road losses at Messiah (by a 67-64 score) and first-place Widener (66-62).

Schlosser is encouraged that his guys are still getting after it. They would like to see results, though. When someone tells Mike Church, the junior center from Solanco, that Schlosser was particularly pleased with the effort against first-place Widener, Church is unmoved.

"The only thing we take out of it is we can definitely beat Widener," he says. "We played 37 minutes, and they played 40. We hope to see them again."

To do that, E-town would have to make the conference tournament for the first time in three years.

"Especially being a senior, I'm conscious of it," says point guard Phil Schaffer, the only senior on the team. "We talk about playing one at a time, but in the back of my mind, we need these three."

The Jays do some other drills, then work on inbounds plays again. Again they struggle.

In time they repair to a classroom. Everybody grabs a copy of Lycoming's stats, and Hasenfuss' scouting report. Schlosser, standing at the front of the room and addressing his seated players, notes Anthony's willingness to launch 3-pointers, and reminds the Jays that the Warriors guard is left-handed.

"At least up there," he says, "he couldn't go right at all."

And Sye, Schlosser notes, is averaging just 22 minutes a game. Part of that is foul trouble; the Lycoming forward has committed nearly three personals a night.

The other part, the coach says, is this: "He gets gassed. We want to make them run."

They go over their defensive matchups. Sophomore guard Keith Fogel will start out on Anthony, though the Jays will, as always, switch constantly on defense. Church will play Sye, but will have double-team help.

While reviewing video of the teams' earlier game, Schlosser mentions the opening tip — how Sye always back-taps the ball, meaning the Jays standing on either side of the center-jump circle would do well to cheat in that direction, in an attempt to gain possession.

Then everyone huddles at the front of the room.

"Tomorrow's not a playoff game," Schlosser says, "but it sure is close to it. ... We still control our own destiny. We're gonna get after it. I believe we deserve it, but we've still gotta make it happen."

Wednesday, Feb. 11, Thompson Gym
True to form, Sye back-taps the opening tip. But Josh Houseal, a junior forward from Hempfield, is anticipating that, and deflects the ball to Fogel. E-town has the night's first possession, and will cash in, courtesy of Fogel's wing jumper.

Then Fogel, with help, forces Anthony right. The Lycoming guard throws an errant pass, leading to a 3-pointer by Joe Flanagan, a sophomore guard from Lancaster Mennonite, at the other end.

Rancourt calls a 30-second timeout, a little over a minute into the game.

The bad practice of the day before had not been an omen. Schlosser, for one, isn't surprised.

"I don't do a good job the day before a game," he says later, "usually because I'm wound up."

"I always like to think," Fogel says, "that if you have a bad practice the day before a game, you're due the next day."

The game is close for the first 15 minutes, but E-town scores 11 of the first half's last 14 points to take a 38-28 lead at the break. Flanagan already has 15 points by then, en route to 20. The Jays' defense has been active, alive. Anthony has three points at intermission, and four turnovers. Sye is 3-for-9 from the field.

Ninety seconds into the second half, the Jays are confronted with a baseline inbounds play, their bugaboo the day before. This time Schaffer pitches it to Fogel, who has been left standing all by himself beyond the arc, near the top of the circle.

Fogel hits the triple, and will tack on five more points over the next seven minutes, as E-town opens up a 55-35 lead.

Fogel is en route to a 14-point night, his biggest output in four games, and will help limit Anthony to 10. It comes two days after Schlosser had asked him to come over to the gym to shoot, and to talk."

It was more for his confidence, to be honest," Schlosser says. "Not his confidence in his shooting; his confidence in me."

Fogel acknowledges that such confidence is "100 percent what I felt when he talked to me." No longer, he says, does he feel he's looking over his shoulder, every time he makes a mistake. Now he's playing free and easy.

The Jays close out the victory. Church has played better than his 2-for-8, five-point, six-rebound stat line would indicate, limiting Sye to 11 points, on 5-for-14 shooting.

"We did what we wanted to do," Church says. "Our guys were there to help. ... He did make two good moves on me. Other than that, I felt good about the battle."

Schlosser briefly meets with his players, then excuses them for the night.

And as his assistants gather around him, he mentions Lebanon Valley, the opponent in three days, on the road. The Dutchmen had played man-to-man against the Jays earlier in the season, but last year at LVC, they had gone zone.

"And," Schlosser says, "we couldn't make a shot.

"There's always something to think about, always another detail that demands attention.

Always.