Not the best showing for Detroit Douglass' Mr. Basketball finalist Darrell Davis, but 'a win is a win'

  • 03/18 - 7:00 PM Boys BasketballFinal
    Detroit Douglass 39
    Goodrich 28
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MARYSVILLE, MI -- It wasn't a standout game Tuesday, March 18, for Detroit Douglass' Mr. Basketball finalist Darrell Davis by any means, but he was fine with that.

"I don't care if we won by a point, a win is a win," Davis said following Douglass' 39-28 methodical, slow-paced Class B quarterfinal win over Goodrich.

The Hurricanes are in the semis for the first time in school history, but it wasn't necessarily because of his offense. Sure, his game-high 15 points helped, but most of them came in the first half while the game remained close.

STORY: Goodrich zone stalled by Detroit Douglass, 39-28, in Class B quarterfinal

Goodrich, appearing in the quarterfinals for the second time in three seasons, had scouted Douglass well. They knew Davis was the key component, a 6-foot-5 combo guard committed to the University of Dayton next season, and their chances of advancing would directly correlate with the game he had.

"It's our job to stop him," Goodrich junior guard Jaylin Thomas said. "Because if we stop him, we stop their team. He's the heart of the team, the beat of their team, so if we stop him we could stop the others."

Davis scored seven of Douglass' 11 points in the second quarter, including a step-back three-pointer with 35 seconds left that extended the Hurricane lead to four. Goodrich held him scoreless in the third but had trouble scoring of its own.

Turnovers, a pair of offensive fouls and giving up easy buckets in transition -- something Goodrich coach Gary Barns cautioned his team against prior -- allowed Douglass to take a two-possession lead.

And then they started slowing things down. Davis dribbled the ball at the top of the key in the final minutes of the fourth, and again for the first four minutes of the fourth, passing it off when a defender would finally get close.

"It was by design," Davis said. He couldn't find a rhythm in the third, "couldn't get a bucket to go in," so they just stopped shooting. When the Goodrich defense became spread out, Davis utilized his speed to take the defender one-on-one and draw a foul.

"I didn't want to spread the court out," Barns said. "I thought that if we stayed, always knew where he was at we'd be fine. But you’ve got to guard him.

"There’s a reason he was one of the Mr. Basketball candidates.”

Aaron McMann covers sports at The Flint Journal. Contact him at amcmann@mlive.com; follow him on Twitter @AaronMcMann.

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