First-quarter offensive flurry from Myles Davis a catalyst in Marion’s win over CP-U

MARION - They hadn’t really seen a junk defense all season, and the Marion Wolves might not again.

Any opponent that watches video of a 75-57 home win over Center Point-Urbana surely will notice how Marion took apart CP-U’s attempt at a box-and-one on all-state guard Brayson Laube.

They’ll notice how fellow guard Myles Davis absolutely went off, hitting four 3-pointers from the corners and collecting 14 straight points for his team at one point in an explosive first quarter. Davis finished with a career-high 19 in the game.

“Just kind of getting the feel,” the University of Iowa baseball recruit said. “I’ve been struggling kind of at the start of the season. Just keep working on the shot in the gym, and then having my guys out here putting their trust in me, knowing that I’ve been working and just getting a ton of good shots. Brayson, just screening off him and getting good shots off that.

“They kept feeding me, and I had the hot hand.”

Calen Claypool was the main dude after Davis, scoring 15 points in the game on the interior. Laube, who came in averaging 21.3 points per game, was perfectly content to distribute and watch his teammates get theirs.

He didn’t score a point until he made a pair of free throws with 2:35 left in the first half and didn’t take his first official field-goal attempt until 2:12 remained. He finished with 10 points.

“Awesome to see Myles come out with that flurry at the start. A game changer,” said Marion Coach Pete Messerli. “He might have had his career high in the first few minutes. I think that loosened up their defense, made them go back to their regular D. They’re a good defensive team, always have been. Physical, tough, always in the right spot. But that gave us a ton of momentum at the start, got the momentum rolling.

“To add another threat on offense just makes us that much more dynamic.”

Marion improved to 8-3 with the win and is unbeaten in the Wamac Conference. Because they had a lot of guys back from last year’s state tournament team, the Wolves beefed up their schedule this season, playing 4A schools Cedar Rapids Kennedy, Cedar Rapids Washington and Iowa City High, as well as Class 3A second-ranked Bondurant-Farrar recently in a game played at Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines.

Sure, they’ve incurred some Ls (to Kennedy, City High and B-F), but they feel they’ll be fully prepared for the postseason because of it.

“We are continuing to build,” Messerli said. “It’s an unfinished product. We’re looking at the big picture. We’ve taken a few losses, but we tried to schedule tough, playing three 4A teams and the second-ranked 3A team, a Waverly team that’s not ranked but is tough. We lost some of those games, but we’re building in the process. We’ve got some high goals ahead of us.”

“Everyone gets along perfect,” Davis said. “Pretty much the same team as last year except for a couple of guys. We all get along, we’re all best friends at school, we hang out together outside of school, watched TCU get blown out last night ... We’re really good right now.”

-----------

AT MARION

CENTER POINT-URBANA (57): Jarret Koppedryer 1-4 0-0 2, Easton Tupa 5-11 0-0 11, Brandon Miller 1-7 3-6 5, Hunter Holmes 4-8 0-0 11, Blayze Havel 1-3 0-0 2, Jackson Brincks 1-3 1-3 3, Cooper Grimm 4-6 1-2 10, Bryer Wiley 3-4 0-0 6, Tyler Clark 1-1 0-0 2, Bryon Buelow 0-0 1-2 1, Drew Schellhorn 0-0 0-0 0, Jerod Thorp 0-0 0-0 0, Ryan Estling 0-0 0-0 0, Chase Short 0-0 0-0 0, Parker Libolt 2-2 0-0 4. Totals 23-49 6-13 57.

MARION (75): Alex Mota 2-7 2-3 6, Calen Claypool 7-8 1-3 15, Brayson Laube 2-8 6-7 10, Myles Davis 7-11 1-1 19, Jordan Fischer 4-5 0-1 8, Trey Franck 1-3 0-0 2, Elijah Smith 2-3 0-0 4, Payton Hodges 3-7 3-3 9, Mason Kinney 0-0 0-0 0, Kaiden Griffith 0-0 0-0 0, Josh Noll 0-0 0-0 0, Logan Adams 0-2 0-0 0, Logan Harris 0-3 0-0 0, Jasper Hancox 0-0 0-0 0, Owen Thilges 1-2 0-0 2. Totals 28-59 13-18 75.

Halftime - Marion 42, Center Point-Urbana 30. 3-point goals - Center Point-Urbana 5-17 (Koppedryer 0-1, Tupa 1-5, Miller 0-2, Holmes 3-6, Brincks 0-1, Grimm 1-2), Marion 4-18 (Mota 0-4, Claypool 0-1, Davis 4-7, Fischer 0-1, Smith 0-1, Hodges 0-2, Adams 0-2). Rebounds - Center Point-Urbana 27 (Holmes 6), Marion 36 (Claypool, Laube 7). Total fouls - Center Point-Urbana 13, Marion 13. Fouled out - None. Turnovers - Center Point-Urbana 13, Marion 10.

Comments: (319)-398-8258, jeff.johnson@thegazette.com