St. Joseph boys sprint past Springdale for tourney title

By: HSSN Staff
Saturday, December 29, 2018 | 10:15 PM

Usually ultra-quick St. Joseph operated at about half speed in the first half of its tournament championship game Saturday night.

Then the Spartans cranked their game into high gear, picked up the pace and ran away with the title.

Matt Arvay and Grant Bendis scored 18 points apiece, and St. Joseph’s all-guard lineup caused havoc for Springdale, as the Spartans beat the Dynamos, 68-56, to win the Spartan Holiday Classic.

“We came into tonight with so much fire because Springdale and us, we’ve had a great rivalry,” said Arvay, a senior. “This was a passionate game.”

St. Joseph (8-2), which won six games last season while dealing with season-ending injuries to Arvay and point guard Daniel Fábregas, extended its winning streak to three games and claimed its second holiday tournament championship in three years.

After scoring 23 points in the first half, the Spartans put up 45 in the second half by forcing Springdale (6-3) into turnovers and turning them into quick baskets. Bendis had six steals, and sophomore Andrew Sullivan added four to go along with 14 points.

“The next thing you know when you see a loose ball, we’re just kind of flinging it down the floor and there’s someone down there,” St. Joseph coach Kelly Robinson said. “We always have a guard that’s just ready to … once they see we’re pretty much going to get that basketball, takes off. Those are back-breakers.”

St. Joseph employed a diamond-and-one defense against Springdale star Mike Zolnierczyk, with Sullivan taking the primary defensive reponsibility against the Dynamos’ dynamic guard. Zolnierczyk scored three points in the first half before heating up in the second, finishing with 18.

“We didn’t do a good job of driving it to the hoop,” Springdale coach Aaron Epps said. “They played that box-and-one on Mike, and I was trying to tell them to drive the ball to the hoop. We shot too many long 3s, and that’s a quick team, and we couldn’t get back fast enough. We needed to do a better job of getting to the rim, and when we did get to the rim, we didn’t finish it enough.”

St. Joseph came out hot, scoring the first nine points on a three-point play by Fábregas and consecutive corner 3-pointers by Arvay and Sullivan.

“That was our goal tonight,” Bendis said. “The rivalry was there; we wanted it more.”

Springdale countered with a 12-4 run to cut its deficit to 13-12 after the first quarter, but Bendis scored eight points in the second to give Springdale a 23-20 halftime lead.

After that relatively low-scoring half, St. Joseph scored 25 points in the third quarter alone. Arvay scored 11 points in the quarter, pouring in three of his four 3-pointers.

“I think (the difference) was mostly just hitting shots,” Arvay said. “Because in the first half … we were turning the ball over. We didn’t shoot much. We got one shot per possession, and that was it. But in the second half, we were getting rebounds, we were getting putbacks, we were moving the ball up the court. That’s how we like to play.”

After an Isaac Kern layup helped Springdale cut St. Joseph’s lead to 50-46 with under six minutes remaining, the Spartans responded with a 13-2 run, holding Springdale without a field goal for nearly four minutes, to effectively put the game away.

“That’s a very good team; they really shoot the ball well,” Epps said. “But you can’t trade baskets. You’ve got to get stops. That defense we played tonight was embarrassing, and that falls on me.”

Zolnierczyk hit three 3-pointers for Springdale, which also got 11 points from Demitri Fritch.

St. Joseph forced 18 turnovers and committed just nine to finish the holiday tournament on a high note.

“Springdale’s a very good basketball team, and they’re having a great year,” Robinson said. “For us to beat a team like Springdale really helps our confidence.”

Doug Gulasy is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Doug at dgulasy@tribweb.com or via Twitter @dgulasy_Trib.

Tags: Springdale, St. Joseph