Scouting: St. Frances vs John Carroll

On Wednesday evening, two of the four most talented teams in the MIAA face off as St. Frances hosted John Carroll. After another quick start, John Carroll enjoyed a respectable lead after the first quarter, but the lead quickly dwindled and following halftime, the Panthers took control of the game an eventually went on to win by a final score of 82-64. With the win St. Frances improves to 4-0 as they’re set to face Gilman this evening. John Carroll falls to 1-3 after a tough schedule to start this shortened season and will travel to Loyola tonight to play a Dons team that cannot be overlooked. [player_tooltip player_id="837919" first="Tyson" last="Commander"] | 6’4 | John Carroll ’22 Despite coming up short, Commander led all scorers with 24 points. He also was heavily involved on the glass as indicated by his 10 rebounds and also blocked three shots. Commander hit an array of three’s late in the game when the score was out of hand, but it showed his determination to play until the final buzzer. In the early goings, Commander was attacking off the bounce in the half court while making it a priority to get out in the lanes during fast breaks for lay ups or dunks. Commander responded well against St. Frances’ pressure defense on his catches and didn’t settle for contested three’s. As mentioned earlier, he was quick to put the ball on the floor, get into the paint and finished a couple of high-arching floaters. Hitting the glass was critical. For a portion of this game, 2022 forward [player_tooltip player_id="777067" first="Cesar" last="Tchilombo"] was out of the game with foul trouble and a hand injury. The Patriots had little to no size during this time and Commander took it upon himself to close out St. Frances possessions with rebounds. [player_tooltip player_id="904668" first="Elijah" last="Davis"] | 6’0 | St. Frances ’21 I had an idea of how this game to would be played prior to tip-off, but what I didn’t know was that Davis would look to come out aggressive as a scorer. Known for his defense and table-setting ability at the point guard position, it’s rare that you see Davis hunt for his own looks. St. Frances came out of the gates slow and their primary scorers simply weren’t hitting shots, so Davis took it upon himself to score nine of his 11 points in the first frame to keep his team in reaching distance. Whether it was driving and finishing at the rim or stopping on a dime and pulling up from 10-to-13 feet, Davis was extremely efficient while holding down the fort until others got going. Byron Irealnd | 6’3 | St. Frances ’21 It’s still alarming to me that Ireland has no offers from Division I or Division II programs despite showcasing a polished game this season. He did so once again in a crucial time for St. Frances after 2021 guard [player_tooltip player_id="836491" first="Khyrie" last="Staten"] took a hard fall, landing on his ribs and keeping him sidelined for the remainder of the game early in the third quarter. Ireland immediately entered the game and buried three three-pointers to give the Panthers a comfortable lead that they would end up building upon. He finished with 11 points in the contest and made plays consistently in the passing lanes on the defensive end as well. [player_tooltip player_id="1089573" first="Derik" last="Queen"] | 6’8 | St. Frances ’24 It seems like with every passing game, you see Queen break out something new within his game that impresses you. For the second and third quarter of this game, the Panthers’ offensive concentration was getting touches to their bigs on the block. Queen was a point of emphasis throughout and made excellent reads while operating in these situations. He was aggressive looking to score and taking advantage of the mismatch, but also kept his head up to locate weakside shooters on the wing or corner. As the game progressed, he had his perimeter opportunities and used deceptive speed off the first step to get to the heart of the defense and make plays for himself or others. [player_tooltip player_id="712747" first="Julian" last="Reese"] | 6’9 | St. Frances ’21 One interesting development that came at the start of this game was not seeing Reese in the starting lineup. I was told it was a "coach’s decision" and was anxious to see how Reese would respond. The Maryland commit came out aggressive and quickly asserted himself in the paint on both ends. Similar to Queen, Reese got his fair share of touches on the block and quickly used his size and strength to bully his way to the rim. In the second half he did a great job of getting out on the break and finishing multiple two-handed dunks to put the exclamation point on the win. Defensively, he was his usual self by blocking or altering over a handful of attempts at the rim. [player_tooltip player_id="777067" first="Cesar" last="Tchilombo"] | 6’8 | John Carroll ’22 Before getting into foul trouble and injuring his hand , Tchilombo had his fingerprints all over this game. He was a big reason the Patriots got out to a lead after the first quarter with his willingness to run the floor and finish over the rim. His relentlessness on the offensive glass helped generate second chance points for his team and he was carrying the rebounding load for John Carroll before his action was limited.