Trey Williams Jr. leads Vashon past Peoria Richwoods in Missouri-Illinois boys basketball matchup at Highland Shootout
HIGHLAND, ILLINOIS – Vashon boys basketball coach Tony Irons was surprised to hear his leading scorer, junior guard Trey Williams Jr., scored 23 points in the Wolverines’ win on Saturday.
Pleasantly surprised, of course.
“I didn’t even know he had that, to be honest with you,” Irons said. “But that’s who we have to be though – different people at different times making plays. I thought we had flashes where different guys during quarters kind of put us on their backs offensively. We are much better collectively than we are individually.
“Trey’s been working extremely hard. I’m proud of him. He’s just got to continue to get better. His best basketball is coming up too.”
Williams was named the game’s most valuable player after scoring a team-high 23 points as Vashon earned an impressive 86-60 victory over Peoria (Ill.) Richwoods on Saturday at the Highland Shootout.
A 6-foot-1 guard, Williams made six of his 13 field goal attempts, including three of six from 3-point range, and knocked down all eight of his free throw attempts. He also dished out four assists, grabbed three rebounds and recorded two steals.
Williams was one of the catalysts as the Wolverines (8-3), the No. 2 team in the SBLive Missouri Power 25 rankings, rallied from a 17-13 deficit after one quarter to outscore Richwoods (10-3) convincingly the rest of the way.
Senior guard Nassir Binion scored 15 points and grabbed nine rebounds. Junior guard Dehrio McCaskill added 12 points and six boards. Nicholas Randall, a springy 6-foot-8 junior forward, grabbed a team-high 10 rebounds and scored nine points.
“We wanted to kind of dictate the tempo early on,” Irons said. “I thought they did a decent job of weathering the storm in the first quarter when we went up seven. Then they hit a big 3 and got a couple big layups and I think that kind of put us back on our heels a little bit. But once we just settled down and started extending our defense and utilizing our pressure and our bodies, then you saw the result of that.”
The Wolverines outscored the Knights 25-9 in the second quarter to take a 38-26 lead into halftime and then outscored the Illinois squad 48-34 over the final two quarters.
“Just play Wolverine basketball,” Irons said, “which is, we want the game sometimes to get up and down. If we were able to get it up and down, we thought we were in good shape.”
Richwoods standout Lathan Sommerville led the Knights with 23 points, 12 rebounds, four blocked shots and three assists.
The 6-10 senior forward headed to Rutgers, who is one of the top 100 prospects in the Class of 2024, made his presence felt but the Wolverines were able to limit his impact on the outcome.
Irons said he was “extremely happy” with how his team was able to handle the talented big man.
“I coached him in AAU, so I’m even more happy,” the coach said.
“We teased each other this summer about actually setting up the game. He’s a heck of a player. He was one of the reasons why we were so successful this year in EYBL and he’s going to do great for Rutgers. I wanted to see if our guys were going to battle him because, obviously, he brings some things in the game that were concern for us. I thought our different bodies were able to kind of wear him down a little bit.”
Senior guard Daquan Little scored 12 points for Richwoods and senior guard Jared Jackson added nine points and eight rebounds.
Vashon - Peoria (Illinois) Richwoods boys basketball
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- Nate Latsch | latsch@scorebooklive.com | @SBLiveMiz
