At Hillcrest, they love to play above the rim.
“We have to take advantage of our size difference,” senior Taylor Adway said. “We need to just go up strong and finish. We have the athletic ability.”
And defense… they love to play defense.
“Man, I don’t know. We practice it all the time,” senior Miles McCoy said. “We just keep going, keep going hard. That’s our Hillcrest defense.”
And when they’re clicking on both ends…
“We have the potential to be one of the best in the state,” Adway said. “It’s all about putting it all together and doing things the right way.”
Hillcrest didn’t do everything the right way in Friday’s 82-30 South Suburban Blue win over Bremen. The Hawks missed four consecutive layups on their first possession and fell behind 7-2.
They were pretty ruthless after that, though.
“They’re very good,” Bremen coach Otis Lane said. “They’re very good at what they do well — pressing, putting pressure on people, and continuing to make you play at a tempo that you normally can’t play at because of the way they play.”
Adway and McCoy made the most of limited minutes, each scoring 14 points. David Gatlin added 11 and DeAngelo Isby had 10, while Cornelius McIntosh grabbed seven rebounds for Hillcrest (15-4, 9-0).
Bremen (12-6, 5-4) was paced by Milton Lawrey with 16 points.
Adway had the final say in what began as a good-natured sparring session with Bremen’s Deamonta Carpenter.
“I’m real good friends with him,” Adway said. “I’ve been going to school with him since the Prairie Hills days. We’ve been talking back and forth about the game all the time.
“We were joking around. Yesterday he texted me, ‘Man, you’ve better get some sleep, because we’re coming for you tomorrow.'”
And the Braves did, if ever so briefly.
After Hillcrest’s faux pas at the start, Chrisean Noble drained a three for Bremen. Lawrey added two more baskets as the Braves went up five. But it was a short-lived tease. Hillcrest finished the quarter by scoring 21 of the next 23 points.
