Pickett leads Lancers charge, tops West for third place
Belleville West lost track of Javon Pickett and, subsequently, lost track of a 14-point lead.
Pickett, the Belleville East senior and University of Illinois commit, scored 30 points to lead the Lancers to an 80-74 win over the Maroons and a hard-fought third-place finish at the Chick-fil-A Classic on Friday.
“I don’t know if our guys knew who he was,” West coach Joe Muniz said. “Slowing him down was one of our keys on defense, and we didn’t do a very good job even finding him.”
Pickett scored from everywhere, hitting 8 for 19 from the field, including a pair of 3-point baskets. It was his 16 second-quarter points that dug the Lancers out of a deep early deficit.
He had plenty of help in the come-from-behind effort. Senior Rico Sylvester, with his timely 3-pointers, scored 23 and Malachi Smith added 16.
As a team, the Lancers were good on 22 of 24 free-throw attempts.
East improved to 11-7, finding resilience after a tough, overtime loss to Chaminade in the tournament semifinals Thursday.
“When you see what we have on our schedule, you realize that any win is a really, really good win,” said East coach Abel Schrader. “We were really out-manned a little bit, but a lot of guys stepped up for us tonight.”
Belleville West fell to 11-5. The Maroons and Lancers meet again in Southwestern Conference play at East on Tuesday.
KEY MOMENTS
Sophomore E.J. Liddell, who had a game-high 33 points and 12 rebounds, helped get West off to a red-hot start as East connected on just one of its first 10 shots from the field. The Maroons opened a 16-2 lead.
That’s when Pickett put the Lancers on his shoulders. He scored the first nine points of the period for East, including a slam dunk that put the Lancers within a point.
Pickett then set up junior Malachi Smith for the go-ahead score with an underhand dish at the 4:29 mark of the half.
The Maroons responded with an 11-2 run highlighted by Liddell’s dunk and 3-pointer. West went into halftime with a 38-35 lead.
They held the lead until less than a minute into the fourth quarter, when Pickett hit three out four free throws after a technical foul knocked 6-foot-5 sophomore Keith Randolph out of the game.
Liddell scored down low to put the Maroons back on top, but a 3-pointer by Pickett put the Lancers ahead for good. They closed on an 11-4 run highlighted by Jordan Yates’ break-away, one-handed jam.
KEY PERFORMERS
Randolph scored 18 for West, starting in place of senior Tyler Dancy, who is still sidelined by a sprained ankle.
Jordan Yates, who fouled out in the fourth quarter, added eight points for East.
This story was originally published January 21, 2017 at 11:01 PM with the headline "Pickett leads Lancers charge, tops West for third place."