South Knoxville News

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The Maryville Scots cut down the home court nets here Saturday, taking with them the spoils of becoming the very first Collegiate Conference of the South men's basketball champion.

 

They also received a beautiful trophy and, if good fortune smiles on them, the chance to keep playing when the NCAA Division III Men's Basketball Championship gets underway next week. As a brand-new conference, the CCS must play its first two years without automatic bids for its champions. Nothing is guaranteed.

 

But those discussions can wait. Today is a day to celebrate Maryville's 84-74 title game victory over Belhaven and completion of the CCS trifecta:

 

• Preseason pick to win the league.
• Winning the league (by three games).
• And winning the tournament (by a combined 32 points in the two games).

The Scots are a very deserving champion.

 

"It's not easy, and it's a tribute to the players and how hard they worked," Maryville head coach Raul Placeres said. "They didn't back down from the early struggles of the year, and some of that was our youth and also the level of competition we were playing.

 

"But they kept believing in the process. That sounds like a cliché, but the great programs stick to the process. We were 8-8 and 2-2 in the league, and we got together in the film room and realized we controlled our own destiny going forward with how hard we're going to work and how hard we're going to prepare. We were going to take it one game at a time, and, man, we sure did that. Ten wins in a row!" 

Player of the Year Was Outstanding

Myles Rasnick followed up his CCS Player of the Year trophy for the regular season by earning the tournament's Most Outstanding Player award. Rasnick scored a game-high 24 points on 11-of-17 shooting to go with six rebounds, five assists and two blocked shots.
 
Joining him on the All-Championship Team were teammates Charlie Cochran and Jackson Garner, along with Belhaven's Matthew McMillan, LaGrange's Bershard Edwards and Piedmont's Ryan Jolly.

Garner scored 21 points after going 5-of-10 from 3-point distance for the second day in a row. That upped his season total to 60 made threes, second in the conference behind only Berea's Isaac Caudill with 63.
 
Cochran scored 12 points to go with 10 rebounds for his league-leading eighth double-double of the season and fourth in the last seven games. Jose Rodriguez led all rebounders with 13.
 
"A guy who goes unnoticed, Jose Rodriguez, had 24 rebounds for the weekend," Placeres said. "You would think, looking at his numbers, that we have a really big post player. The guy is 6-2.
 
"We don't call him the Swiss Army Knife; we call him the Puerto Rican Army Knife. He's been fantastic." 

Scots Never Trailed

Maryville led wire-to-wire in this one, scoring its first four baskets on 3-pointers by Garner, Rasnick, Garner and Garner again. The Scots led 12-4 at that point and 17-9 when Garner made it 4-of-4 from downtown with exactly 14:00 on the first-half clock.
 
The Scots were in front 35-21 when both teams went ice cold. Maryville didn't score for the next 5:09, but Belhaven during that stretch scored just three points. A pair of Garner free throws in the closing seconds made it 46-31 Maryville at intermission.
 
Rasnick scored 12 points in the first half and 12 in the second, outshining everyone over the last 20 minutes except maybe for Belhaven's McMillan. Rasnick put on a shooting clinic (6-of-8) against stiff defensive competition to keep the Scots in front by as many as 20 points and never by fewer than eight.
  
"Not only did he show he's the player of the year but he's also the defensive player of the year," Placeres said. "He played against two of the top scorers in our league and held them to 4-of-20 for the weekend." 

Blazing Hot from Downtown

Belhaven's McMillan was 6-of-7 from the floor in the second half, including 4-of-4 from 3-point distance. For the weekend, McMillan finished 10-of-12 from downtown and scored 35 points in 43 minutes played. Definitely All-Championship worthy.
 
Placeres calls his Scots NCAA worthy, touting an 18-8 mark against lethal competition in the nonconference and near perfect play down the stretch. When it matters most.
 
"We're an NCAA tournament team," he said. "You want to be playing your best at the end of February and leading into March. We've won 10 in a row, and under the pressure of everyone trying to beat us.
 
"Kudos to my players for making all this happen. Awards and plaques and certificates – those things collect dust. Banners are forever. This 2022-23 team forever will be remembered for playing one of the toughest nonconference schedules, being the first CCS men's basketball champion and the first CCS tournament champion for Maryville Athletics – the first of many!" 

Original source can be found here