Sanders' career high 12 points leads Lincoln over U-High, 42-24

 

[January 20, 2024]  Normal – It may not have gone exactly according to the plans of LCHS coach Neil Alexander, but all’s well that ended well for the Railers as Frank Sanders scored a career-high 12 points to lead Lincoln to a critical 42-24 victory over Central State 8 conference foe University High School of Normal.

With one player out due to illness and another who had been stranded away from home with his family due to poor travel conditions, Alexander juggled his lineup, inserting Sanders into a starting role to help negate the post play of U High’s 6-foot-5 Owan Nelson.

“We were a hodge-podge the first half,” Alexander said. “Once we got settled in the second half, I thought we played a lot harder, we played a little bit smarter and we hit some shots.”

Nelson still made his presence inside known, scoring a dozen points for the Pioneers while grabbing 6 rebounds, However, the Railers showed patience on offense, sometimes attacking the U High defense by driving inside to shoot from close range, other times by driving and dishing the ball outside for a shot from the perimeter as the Pioneer defense collapsed.
 

The tactic finally paid dividends late in the game for Lincoln. The Railers led 24-22 after three quarters but surged ahead of the Pioneers by outscoring U-High 18-2 in the final period to pull away for the victory.

Coach Neil Alexander

“Our goal was to get up by six or eight and then spread them,” Alexander said. “Ki’on [Railer senior Carson] is hard to cover one on one.”

Once Lincoln got the lead Alexander was seeking, the LCHS coach gave his players a dose of on-the-job training by having the team run an unfamiliar offense. Coach Alexander had his squad run a slow-down offense, with players penetrating the lane as they were able and dishing the ball back out to open shooters.

“We haven’t worked on that,” Alexander said of the offensive scheme he instructed the Railers to use during a fourth quarter timeout. “They had no clue what I was talking about. For stepping out on the court and doing it, that was pretty much what it’s supposed to look like.”

While Sanders may have been the kernel of the Railer offense in leading Lincoln in scoring, the team got contributions from throughout the lineup. Point guard Ki’on Carson directed the offense, with an increased role in handling the ball in the fourth quarter and only committing a pair of turnovers in the game. Karson Komnick, Trey Schilling, Aidan Gowin and Drew Hayes all hit 3-pointers for the Railers, keeping the Pioneer defense honest by forcing U-High to guard the Railers on the perimeter rather than sagging back into the lane on defense. Brady Miller contributed some valuable minutes in spelling Carson and helping with ballhandling duties.

Frank Sanders

But the story of the game was Sanders. The 6-foot-5 junior was 6-for-6 from the field, as he was left alone several times while other Lincoln players drove to the basket; his defender would move away from Sanders to help, leaving Sanders with no Pioneers nearby and open to receive a pass for a close-range shot.

Sanders tallied two of his points on a last-second putback shot to give Lincoln a 2-point advantage heading into the final period.

Gowin scored a 3-pointer for the Railers to open the fourth quarter scoring. U-High got a basket from Miller, but that proved to be the final points of the game for the Pioneers.

Meanwhile, the Railers found a variety of tactics to put points on the board in the remainder of the game. Lincoln scored from inside as Sanders hit a pair of close-range shots and Hayes added another. The Railers scored from outside with Komnick and Schilling each hitting 3-pointers. LCHS scored added a couple second-chance points when Sanders corralled a rebound and hit a putback shot. The squad added another point from the free throw line.

Overall, Lincoln shot 54.8 percent (17 of 31) from the field, including 6 of 13 (46.2 percent) on 3-pointers. U-High made 12 of 30 (40 percent) of its field goal attempts overall while missing all 12 3-point attempts.

Karson Komnick

Komnick added 10 points for the Railers, who improved to Lincoln, which improved to 15-6 overall and 7-1 in the Central State 8. The U-High loss drops the Pioneers to 15-7 overall and 4-3 in league play.

The Railers travel to Rock Island for a 6:30 PM contest against the Class 4A Rocks on Saturday.

[Loyd Kirby]