It was far from a rocky start for Marist sophomore Maurice Commander. Nevertheless, the 5-foot-11 point guard realized it couldn’t hurt to recalibrate his navigation at halftime.
“One of my assistant coaches told me to attack,” Commander said. “He said I was going too much east and west, and to go north and south. Once he told me that, I got aggressive.”
Commander stormed the rim and poured in 15 of his team-high 22 points in the third quarter Friday night. The host RedHawks survived a furious late-game rally from Joliet Catholic for a 65-60 East Suburban Catholic victory.
“We had to come out and fight for this,” Commander said. “We lost two big games against Marian and Benet, and this was another big test that we tried to pass.”
Marist (19-5, 4-3) and Joliet Catholic (17-5, 3-4) entered halftime tied at 20, but Commander’s outburst ballooned the RedHawk lead to 44-26 after he scored a rare five-point play. He had a 3-point play and hit two technical free throws.
But Joliet Catholic never threw in the towel.
Jalen Jackson, the conference’s reigning scoring champion, chalked up 27 points. He scored 13 in the fourth. Jackson cut Marist’s lead to 53-51 midway through the quarter on a contested 3-pointer. He finished with seven threes.
“We let it slip away early in the third quarter, but from then on I thought we played excellently,” Joliet Catholic coach Joe Gura said. “The other side of the coin is the other team’s pretty good. I’ve got to compliment (coach) Gene Nolan and Marist.”
Chamar Hawkins responded for the RedHawks after Jackson made it a one-possession game. The 6-3 senior parted the lane and rose up for a slam dunk, giving Marist a 57-51 lead.
“I thought (the defender) wasn’t going to let me go to the hole, but once I got him on my hip, the lane was wide open,” Hawkins said. “So I went up. The two defenders in the paint looked like they weren’t going to jump, so I just said, ‘OK, I’m going to do it.'”
Hawkins finished with 17 points and six rebounds. Morgan Taylor added 14 points and Kevin Lerma had seven.
“Oh, man, their guards are tough,” Gura said. “We held them in check for a while and again at the end, but I like how we fought back and stayed together.”
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Harold Davis chipped in 13 points for the Hilltoppers. Pete Ragen had 10.
Nolan rushed to the hospital immediately after speaking to his team. The coach and his family are celebrating the birth of his third daughter.
Logan Malloy is a freelance writer for the Daily Southtown.