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Starting their vacation right

Marquette boys use their bench to top rival Negaunee

Marquette’s Luke Ogea jumps to make a basket as Negaunee’s Jacob Ennett (behind) and Luke Skewis try to defend Friday evening at Lakeview Elementary School. (Journal photo by Corey Kelly)

By RYAN SPITZA

Journal Sports Writer

NEGAUNEE — Christmas came early for the Marquette boys basketball team as junior guard Raffy Millado dropped 13 points to help the Redmen notch their third straight victory over Negaunee 62-36 at the Lakeview Memorial Gym Friday night.

Marquette improved to 3-3 on the season while Negaunee fell to 3-2.

Marquette head coach Brad Nelson said clutch scoring from the bench is what sealed the win for his team.

“There were spurts in the game where we kind of took our foot off of the gas pedal and let them creep back into it,” he said. “I thought Liam Darr coming in off of the bench and hitting three 3s in the third quarter kind of ended the game and that’s what we’re going to need going forward especially when we were in the foul trouble we were in. That’s what good teams do and we were able to do that tonight.”

Nelson added he’s looking forward to the holiday break before getting back into it in 2018.

“These guys have been going at it since November 18th, not a lot of days off,” he said. “Now we’ll give them four days off to enjoy with their families and then we’ll get ready for next year.”

Marquette senior forward Treylon McFerrin said his team played strong and is looking forward to the break.

“It came easier than we thought it would,” he said. “We played, we fought through and the end result was what we wanted. We’ll enjoy our days off and then get right back into the gym so we can get some more wins.”

Negaunee head coach Dan Waterman said his team competed against a tough opponent.

“I’m proud of my guys and that’s a good Marquette team,” he said.

“We got down big early and just couldn’t get any shots to fall. I thought our kids kept digging and kept competing and got ourselves back into the game and then they had a big sequence at the end of the first half where they hit three 3s in a row.

“We didn’t hang our heads. We came out, kept fighting, kept scrapping and there are a lot of positives for us to take out of this game. Nothing to be ashamed of, and give credit to a really good team for playing really well in a rivalry game.”

Marquette raced out to a 6-0 lead early in the contest on baskets from McFerrin, Millado and sophomore guard Luke Ogea.

Negaunee got on the board on a 2-point jumper from sophomore guard Jason Waterman, but the Redmen kept pouring it on after that, scoring nine more points to take a 15-4 lead at the end of the first quarter.

The Miners pulled within six in the second quarter on a 3-pointer from senior guard Jacob Ennett to make the score 19-13.

After that though, the Redmen drained three consecutive 3-pointers from Darr, Ogea and Millado with a couple of free throws sprinkled into the sequence to make the Marquette lead 30-15 and forcing Waterman to call timeout. Millado later added a layup to make the score 32-17 at the half.

Marquette continued to pour it on in the second half, coming out and scoring the first six points of the third quarter to gain a comfortable 38-17 lead.

Negaunee got the score down to 13 points at 40-27, but that’s as close as they came as the Redmen pulled away with ease in the end.

Ogea added 11 points for the Redmen while McFerrin tallied 10. Sophomore guard Jakson Sager led the Miners with 11 points while Waterman had nine.

Negaunee will host Manistique on Thursday. Marquette hosts Gladstone on Jan. 3.

Marquette won the JV contest 49-34.

Email Ryan Spitza at sports@miningjournal.net.

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