Javonte Holmes has Memphis East believing it can do something special
For the first time in just a year, Memphis East didn’t have a signature name on its roster entering the 2019 season. The many people who were paying attention to the Mustangs’ dominance in Class AAA quickly turned their heads…
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Continue ReadingFor the first time in just a year, Memphis East didn’t have a signature name on its roster entering the 2019 season.
The many people who were paying attention to the Mustangs’ dominance in Class AAA quickly turned their heads after James Wiseman and Malcolm Dandridge graduated and headed off to the University of Memphis.
After Memphis East lost to Knoxville Bearden in the Class AAA Boys State Championship last season, the Mustangs quickly became an afterthought, which didn’t seem to bother head coach Javonte Holmes heading into his second season with the team.
Of course, it’s hard to replace Wiseman, the 7-footer who headlined the 2019 class, and Dandridge, a 6-9 forward that was a handful on both ends of the court, but Holmes was prepared to lead a team with a collective group of good players.
Holmes sensed over the summer that people were going to write off Memphis East of being competitive in Class AAA. He laughed at the notion and took it with a grain of salt. To make this season more meaningful and desirable, Holmes told his players to stay the course and work hard, despite the outsiders looking the other direction.
“I got the ultimate confidence in these guys,” Holmes said after his team’s 89-76 win over Whitehaven Tuesday night. “For me, it’s personal, too. A lot of people in the city were like ‘He’s just a trainer. He’s not a coach.’ A lot of people used that to try and recruit against me.
“Personally, they know they didn’t get the respect and personally for me, because guys don’t know my background, because I coached before I was a trainer,” said Holmes, who was an assistant coach under Jimmy Adams from 2004-09 at Raleigh-Egypt High School. “So, it works hand in hand. Me as a coach and them as players, we are both on a mission to show the state and everybody that we are for real.”
The Mustangs have marquee non-league wins this season over Wooddale (twice), Center Hill, Pebblebrook, South Shore, Marion and Chaminade. Memphis East is currently 16-4 overall and 5-0 in league play, coming off an impressive win over the Tigers, who came into Tuesday’s matchup riding a five-game winning streak.
The Mustangs simply exposed Whitehaven’s weaknesses. The Tigers didn’t have an answer for senior forward Duane Posey, a transfer from Melrose, who finished with 18 points and 11 rebounds. Memphis East kept Whitehaven from getting easy 3s in transition, which made the Tigers’ offense stagnant at times. The Mustangs grabbed a double-digit lead in the second quarter off a score from sophomore forward Markese Washington and maintained it the rest of the way.
Playing from behind forced Whitehaven to play desperate, which is something this team doesn’t like to do.
Most importantly, junior guard Tadarius Jacobs made big shots for Memphis East to help it maintain a double-digit lead. He scored 13 of his 28 points in the third quarter. He also added seven rebounds. Senior forward Kylan Haywood added 14 points and eight rebounds and senior point guard Isaiah Cathey finished with 14 points and six assists.
A season ago, the Mustangs couldn’t get this type of balanced scoring from four different players. Everything was placed on Wiseman and Dandridge’s shoulders. This season, everyone is contributing.
“I think the difference between last year’s group and this year’s group is that last year’s group got comfortable with Malcolm and James back there,” Holmes said. “They can make up for a lot of mistakes. The guards were comfortable with doing certain things. You didn’t have to make the pinpoint pass.
“You can just throw it up in the air and James and Malcolm will just go get it. This year, we have to be more solid fundamentally. We have to be more solid defensively. We have to be more on the string defensively, because we don’t have a 7-footer, we don’t have a 6-9 player back there who can clean up everything you do.”
Memphis East held the Tigers to 27 points at halftime. Whitehaven made only two 3s in the first half, which was the story of the game since the Tigers live and die by the 3-point shot.
“Defensively, we have been stepping up big time, because we can’t afford to make a lot of mistakes defensively.”