By Stu Swartz
Elkhart Memorial won every quarter Friday night and, obviously, prevailed handily in the game.
The Crimson Chargers were dominant on defense, shutting down the Goshen Redskins for a 46-28 Northern Lakes Conference high school boys basketball victory at North Side Gym.
Memorial scored the first 11 points of the game, the Redskins followed with nine to get within two and the Crimson Chargers broke it open again with a 10-point blitz.
Goshen never got within 10 again in dropping to 6-7 overall on the season, 2-3 in the NLC.
The Redskins host Mishawaka in a non-conference game Tuesday and Plymouth in a league outing next Friday.
The numbers weren’t pretty for GHS — 8-of-36 shooting from the field overall, 16 turnovers and just three players scoring points.
Redskin coach Brian Bechtel said, “Anemic would be the word. We were just awful on offense. We couldn’t get into the flow of this game.
“Memorial did a great job pressuring us and taking us out of any offensive rhythm. We had been doing a better job in recent games against pressure, but took a step back in this one.
“They doubled (6-7 senior) Taylor Kolbus and that is going to happen until we have some other players step up their scoring.
“Actually, I thought we played fairly well defensively in this game. We matched up on them and they settled for jump shots a lot.
“But, you can’t shoot 22 per cent from the field and beat anyone. They also took it to us on the boards (37-22), scoring several times on offensive putbacks.
“Every one of our losses can be attributed to struggles on offense. I thought we were emotionally ready to play this game, but we never got into it mentally.
“We need to be a lot tougher mentally. We let Memorial’s physical play bother us.”
Kolbus had 15 points and seven rebounds for the Redskins and 6-1 junior Carson Roberts 11 points. Jake Speicher, 6-2 sophomore, hit two free throws for the only other points.
Michael Kibiloski, 6-7 senior, had 11 points and 10 rebounds for Memorial; 6-3 senior Antonio Sanders 10 points and eight boards; 6-2 sophomore Urston Smith nine points and nine rebounds.
A 3-pointer by Roberts from the left corner got Goshen within 10 for the last time at 26-16 with 3:58 to play in the third quarter.
