Unselfish play, clutch shooting carries Blue Devils to weekend sweep

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — Bradley Longcor III caught the ball in a position to take a shot he’s been knocking down consistently all season.

And he passed it up.

Nothing could have made Quincy High School boys basketball coach Andy Douglas any happier.

After Terron Cartmill snared a defensive rebound on the first possession of Saturday night’s game against Springfield, he pushed the ball upcourt and snapped a pass to Longcor on the wing. He bypassed shooting the 3-pointer and kicked the ball to Reed O’Brien all alone in the corner.

O’Brien buried the shot and hit another corner trey on the next possession, setting the tone for a 57-30 victory over the Senators at Willard Duey Gym.

“Brad could have had a great shot, but he passed it up for a better one,” Douglas said. “That’s a really great way to start the game.”

It defined how the Blue Devils played. Seven different players scored in the first half and nine scored overall as Quincy (13-3) finished with 14 assists on 21 field goals.

“I felt we played as a team, and that got everyone involved,” Longcor said. “We often made the best and most simple play, and that contributed to the easy-flowing offense.”

Douglas wasn’t certain he’d see that.

Friday night’s 61-57 victory at Rock Island, which pushed the Blue Devils into sole possession of first place in the Western Big 6 Conference, could have resulted in a letdown. The only previous weekend with back-to-back road trips — Quincy went to United Township and Centralia in mid-December — resulted in the Blue Devils’ only pre-Christmas loss.

“You wonder how they’re going to respond,” Douglas said. 

Energetic is how.

“We were very focused and always tried to find the best shot,” Longcor said. “To go into tonight, we knew we could not let up and let the other team have a chance. So everyone dialed in and it worked out in the end.”

The Blue Devils led 11-5 heading into the second quarter before getting a boost from freshman guard Dominique Clay, who came off the bench to score seven points in the frame. He reached double digits with a 3-pointer midway through the third quarter that punctuated a 16-4 run.

Longcor scored 10 points in the run as the two freshmen combined to outscore the Senators themselves. Clay finished with a game-high 16 points, while Longcor had 15.

Peyton Webster, the younger brother of former Quincy University women’s basketball standout Anika Webster, led the Senators with eight points.

“Our guys did a really good job of staying patient and getting the best look,” Douglas said. “Brad did a really good job all night of getting inside and creating, whether it was for himself or for somebody else. He did a really good job of seeing the floor, and everybody really played that way.”

It made it easy to overlook that Jeremiah Talton, the team’s leading scorer at 20.8 points, finished with just eight points. Springfield tried to take him away by using a box-and-1 defense, so the rest of the Blue Devils did their part.

“While Jeremiah didn’t have the points, he opened up a lot for everybody,” Douglas said. “One of the things we stressed at the beginning was unselfish play. Not that we have selfish guys, but we wanted to continue on the trend of what dictates our success and that’s what they did.”

It gave the Blue Devils back-to-back victories to start 2022 and an injection of swagger.

“It just boosted our team chemistry and being able to play together,” Lopngcor said. “Coach said that it was very important to start off the new year the way we have so far.”