Big men propel Miller to victory

If the NBA is looking to spice up this year’s Slam Dunk Contest, perhaps commissioner David Stern should place a call to the Miller School — the Mavericks have three guys who know how to throw it down.
Brice Kofane, Hippolyte Tsafack and Mychal Parker combined for eight dunks and 48 points to lead Miller to a 66-54 win at Covenant on Thursday evening.
The Mavericks, who dropped a hotly contested game with Benedictine on Tuesday, went to the post early and often to take advantage of an undersized Eagles squad.
“Benedictine beat us by going small and our size hurt us. Today, our size was an advantage because we got it into them more and shot less threes,” said Miller coach Scott Willard. “The bigs got a lot of touches, we worked out of the post and we ended up getting some easy baskets.”
Miller is accustomed to seeing zone defenses thrown at their formidable size, but Covenant decided to use a man-to-man defense that kept the Eagles in the game in the first half.
“We tried everything but they did a good job of using their size,” said Covenant coach Ben D’Alessandro, whose team trailed by only seven points at halftime. “Once we dug ourselves a hole in the third quarter, we didn’t feel like we could go zone and shorten the game. We wanted to lengthen the game to get back in it.
The third quarter indeed proved to be a long one for the Eagles. Parker took over for Miller in the period, knocking down two deep 3-pointers and gliding to the rim for a one-handed slam while pouring in eight of his team-high 18 points in the frame.
While Parker was heating up from distance, Kofane did his damage around the rim. The lanky 6-foot-8 forward scored 17 points and grabbed 10 rebounds in the game and altered numerous shots near the basket.
“He’s an unbelievable talent. He can guard five positions, block shots. You just need him on the floor,” Willard said. “He’s got a ton of energy and it brings up our whole team.”
While Miller had no problem getting their three stars involved, Covenant’s go-to guy, Sam Dale, struggled to find a rhythm against taller defenders. Miller held Dale scoreless until 2:15 to play in the third quarter and held the senior standout and team’s leading scorer to nine points and four rebounds in the game.
“During every timeout, we talked about him [Dale],” Willard said. “We said he’s going to go off at some point; let’s make sure it’s late and it’s contested.”
While Dale was sputtering offensively, Covenant got a spark from junior Isaac Stewart-Silver who poured in a game-high 20 points, including four bombs from behind the
3-point line.
Stewart-Silver was the only Eagles player to successfully take advantage of the 2-3 zone Miller (7-5) used against a traditionally hot-shooting Covenant team.
“Most people probably wouldn’t play zone against a team of shooters, but with our length we can get out and disrupt things a little bit,” Willard added.
In addition to Parker’s 18 and Kofane’s 17 points, Tsafack scored 13 points and pulled down 13 rebounds for Miller.
Maleek Frazier chipped in 12 points for Covenant.
After a tough loss earlier in the week, Miller was glad to get a quality win over a hard-nosed Covenant team.
“We want to be really good by the end of the year and today was a big stepping stone,” Willard said.