AMHERST, Mass. -- Two big runs proved the difference for the Drury boys basketball team in Saturday’s season-opening 73-45 win over Hopkins Academy at the Pioneer Valley Tip-Off at Curry Hicks Cage.
The first came at the start of the second quarter, an 18-4 spurt that helped Drury take a 12-point lead into half-time.
The second came midway through the third, after the Hawks closed to within nine, a 14-2 run that pushed the lead to 21 and dashed Hopkins’ hopes for a comeback.
Drury captains Scott McGuire Jr. and Reece Racette led the way with 35 and 22 points, respectively. They also accounted for 19 rebounds between them in the first of what the Blue Devils hope will be three games at the Cage this winter.
Coach Jack Racette recognized his team’s potential to get on top of teams in a hurry.
“We’re a team who is going to make runs,” Drury coach Jack Racette said. “We’re going to have droughts where we don’t score, but when we go on runs, we’ll go 10-0, 12-0, and that flips the scoreboard quickly.
“But when you can’t get those runs going, you might find yourself on the wrong side of a loss.”
Drury was all right on Saturday thanks largely to its defense, which keyed both those decisive stretches.
“Honestly, coming into this game, it’s opening day, it’s at the Cage, and you can’t expect all your shots to go down,” Reece Racette said. “I’ve been pushing on our guys … If we can defend, that’s going to lead us into our offense. We were able to do that today.
“If we’re holding teams in the 40s, we’re absolutely giving ourselves the best chance to win. I couldn’t stress it enough. We came into half-time, we were up 12, but we’ve got to play like it’s 0-0. Our defense is going to win us ballgames, and our offense is going to be based off of our defense.”
Freshman Tim Brazeau scored his first varsity points and the first points of the second quarter with an assist from Racette to make it 14-10 and ignite the first big run. A couple of turnovers from the Drury press fueled the run, which ended with a baseline jumper by Racette to make it 30-14.
Hopkins opened the second half with a 6-3 spurt to make it 40-31. But Racette hit a mid-range jumper on Drury’s next possession to make it a double-digit lead for good.
A steal by Cove Massey that led to a McGuire lay-in with 1:25 left in the third quarter gave Drury its first 20-point lead at 53-33.
Jack Racette said that his team’s depth was a factor against the 2018 Western Massachusetts Division 4 finalists.
“We got good play from Cove Massey,” Racette said. “He knocks down a 3, gets a steal for a basket. He’s a first-year player, so we’ll have to get him experience before we get to Game 20. But I thought he gave us a spark.
“And I thought Dante Woodson showed us some good things. We’ve got to find our roles as a team.”
Massey scored five points. Woodson came off the bench to grab nine rebounds and pass out a couple of assists.
McGuire was named the player of the game by the organizers of the Tip-Off, a three-day event that featured six games on Saturday and four prep school games on Sunday.
“Once we got steals, in the open floor, Scott was phenomenal today,” Jack Racette said. “He had some great moves to the basket.”
Drury goes to Turners Falls on Wednesday. Its first home game will be its fourth game of the year, on Dec. 19 against Taconic, which fell to Putnam on Saturday at the Cage.
