Trail Blazers believe November setback will benefit them in February’s postseason pursuit

QUINCY — Come February, Jarvis Jennings believes the scenario plays out differently.

Three months from now, Brad Hoyt expects to make a wiser decision.

Together, they are supremely confident the John Wood Community College men’s basketball team will be entertaining a shot at reaching the NJCAA Division II national tournament because of what transpired Saturday at the Student Activity Center.

Tied at 81 with sixth-ranked Des Moines Area Community College 33.5 seconds remaining in overtime, the Trail Blazers got the ball into Jennings’ hands on the right wing. Although the play didn’t develop as smoothly as Hoyt, the veteran coach with six national tourney appearances on his resume, would have liked, he hesitated to call a timeout with 20 seconds remaining and reset the offense.

Instead, Jennings drove hard to the basket, lost his balance and turned the ball over. It allowed the Bears’ Greg Brown to sprint to the other end with the ball, convert at the rim while drawing a foul 1.2 seconds remaining and put away an 85-81 victory in the final game of the John Wood November Classic.

“You have to take that to the chin,” said Jennings, the sophomore All-American forward. “I just wasn’t able to get it done. Coach Hoyt put me in the right position and the right setting to get it done. I wasn’t able to get it done. That’s on me.”

Hoyt felt he should have called a timeout 

“Everything gets magnified in the last minute,” Hoyt said. “I should have called another timeout with 20 seconds left. That’s on me. We called a set, we got into it a little early, we broke down a little bit and I had a timeout to burn. It comes down to possessions for players, but it also does for coaches.

“That’s why we play these high-level games in November so we can try to figure that out.”

The 11th-ranked Trail Blazers (2-2) are in the midst of the toughest, high-level stretch of their season.

They split their two Classic games, beating No. 8 Henry Ford Community College on Friday night, and travel to No. 1-ranked Kirkwood Community College on Tuesday. It’s showing a team with a rebuilt frontcourt and a different cast of characters coming off the bench what it can accomplish.

“We learned a lot about each other through the ups and downs,” said freshman guard Brandon Kracht, the Clark County product who had 16 points and made three 3-pointers. “All around, we saw what we need to get better at. I wish we could have come out with the victory and proved to a lot of national people that we belong on top because I truly feel like we do.

“But this loss will motivate us to be better.”

Four games into the season, the Trail Blazers understand they have the capability of competing with anyone.

“We learned our personality,” Jennings said. “We have to realize we are in the conversation. We are going to be in close games. We are going to compete with the best teams. We’re that team as well. Guys need to know that about ourselves.”

Jennings certainly helped show that.

He scored a season-high 37 points, going 18 of 19 from the free-throw line, grabbing 11 rebounds and dishing out four assists. He made two free throws with 5.5 seconds remaining at the end of regulation to force overtime.

His second-half effort alone — 26 points over the final 20 minutes — helped the Trail Blazers erase an eight-point halftime deficit. But he insisted it was defense that turned the tide.

The Trail Blazers held the Bears to 38.2 percent shooting from the field in the second half and just 4 of 14 from 3-point range. DMACC went 7 of 15 from 3-point range in the first half.

“You can make a million mistakes on offense, but if you get a stop on defense, it doesn’t matter,” Jennings said. “Fix the problems on offense, get stops on defense and that’s how you can win a game.”

The defense will be challenged plenty moving forward, and the Trail Blazers are confident they will meet that challenge.

“It’s a big game Tuesday and we can prove yet again we belong,” Kracht said.