Placek's 33 leads West past Cadillac

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Traverse City West's Graeme Placek drives to the basket against Cadillac Tuesday. Record-Eagle/Keith King

February 1, 2012

Win moves Titans into second place in Big North

By MIKE ECKERT meckert@record-eagle.com The Record Eagle Wed Feb 01, 2012, 07:28 AM EST

TRAVERSE CITY — As a three-year varsity player at Traverse City West, Graeme Placek had never beaten Cadillac.

His 33 points helped do the trick on Tuesday, as the Titans beat the Big North Conference rival Vikings 69-60 at West.

"It feels really good," Placek said. "They're a great team, so this was a big win."

West (9-4, 6-2 BNC) set the tempo early with a 15-8 advantage in the first quarter — including a 9-2 run to begin the game. Placek sparked the early start with 11 points.

"It was big," he said. "Cadillac's a great team and we had to bring our A game. To come out swinging like that was big to get the tempo going."

As good as Placek was in the first quarter, he was even better in the fourth with 12 points to seal the win.

"Having 12 in the fourth quarter was big, because you've got to keep going and play 32 minutes," Placek said. "I've got to give credit to my teammates. They helped me through it."

"We didn't have an answer for Graeme tonight," Cadillac coach Jeff McDonald said. "He was really, really good. And I thought Donny Cizek really hurt us with penetration and toughness. It was two good teams playing real hard tonight, and they got the better of us."

The Vikings (8-3, 5-3 BNC) trailed 45-41 going into the fourth quarter, but never took the lead. They made it close — getting to within three twice.

Off a West turnover, Nick Paquet knocked down a 3-pointer to cut the Titans lead to 63-60 with 49 seconds left.

West, though, made free throws down the stretch to seal the win. Jeremiah Williams and Trevor Commissaris each hit one while Placek was 4-for-4 — getting two off a foul and two more from a McDonald technical — in the last minute.

"That was the best fourth quarter we've played," West coach Brett Graham said. "The people that came in off the bench came in ready to play and contributed. They played great off the bench."

Cadillac's best stretch came early in the third quarter when Nick Paquet made three straight 3-pointers for a 37-31 lead.

"We hit some threes to give us a lead, but they came right back at us," McDonald said. "When we had a chance when it was really close in the third quarter, we missed the some front ends on some one-on-ones. And we missed some lay-ups that we flat-out needed to make. They pressure you and force you to play fast. So you have to convert on those."

John Simons led the Vikings with 29 points and 10 rebounds.

"He's a heck of a player," Graham said. "The other time we junked it up on him and he had 36. So we wanted to play him more straight up. To their credit, their other kids made shots. They shot really well and made it tough on us."

Nick Paquet had 14 points while David Paquet had 10 points.

"Nick's a shooter," McDonald said. "It was nice to see him get going. And he can play better yet. He missed the first our first six games and is just starting to work himself back into it. Hopefully, he's going to keep getting better and better."

Cizek had 12 points for the Titans, Commissaris had eight points and seven rebounds while Walter Borkovich came off the bench for seven points.

The Titans had struggled shooting over the last couple of weeks, but seemed to put it behind them on Tuesday.

"I thought we had been playing tentatively," Graham said. "To the guys credit, they asked if they could come in on Sunday and have a practice. We typically take Sundays off, but we shot for an hour on Sunday. Whether that had anything to do with it or not, I'm not sure. But I thought we played with a lot of confidence tonight."

West will be on the road at Alpena on Friday while Cadillac will host Ogemaw Heights.

In the JV game, West won 61-48. The game was tied 32-32 at the half.

Alex Scott had 18 points for the Titans while Octavian Waugh came off the bench for 15 points. Tristan Roman scored 11 points, Chris Pearl had 10 and Jonny Wheelock had 13 rebounds for the Titans (9-4, 7-1 BNC).

West's freshmen also won, 52-40. Damian Durga had 19 points while Dominic Culver scored 15 points.