Both Marauders, Eagles striving for more as Maclay tops NFC in early season meeting

The Battle for Meridian Road once again lived up to the hype, this time on the hardwood. While the offense did take a while to get going, seeing both teams combine for 39 points by halftime, the Marauders and Eagles put on a show all the way to the final buzzer.

Maclay walked away with a seven points victory over North Florida Christian (NFC), 52-45, but it took the Marauders some time to find stability in its game before taking off. NFC had spurts of energy throughout but just couldn't find that run to take over for a lead.

There was a winner and a loser in this game, but this being both teams' first regular-season game of the year, there's a lot of molding both teams want to do by February. Maclay is a squad that has a lot of depth this season and NFC is a young team with a lot of athleticism.

They're two teams in two different places, but share the same feeling of striving for more, going deeper into their schedules.

Finding chemistry

After dealing with injuries on and off throughout last season, and missing its two bigs last season in junior forward Blaise Wallace and senior forward Jaquay Randolph, Maclay is playing with a full roster for the first time. The depth and talent are there, but the Marauders are still working on putting all of it together.

"We're nowhere where we want to be and there's a lot of work ahead," Marauders head coach Eugene Granger said. "We missed 19 free throws, 13 3-pointers, and 16 turnovers. We've got a lot of work to do."

Turnovers were aplenty on both sides of the ball, seeing the ball mishandling sting the Eagles a little bit more. However, in the first half, Maclay struggled in its putback game. The ball clinked or rolled everywhere but into the hoop. However, the Marauders held on to a narrow 20-19 lead at halftime.

In the second half, Maclay cleaned up its all-around game in the paint, capitalizing on second chances and finishing straight up to go to the line multiple times. Wallace and Randolph were able to up open their games after being heavily guarded in the first half. Wallace downed nine of his 16 in the second half and Randolph netted 11 of his 18.

"In the first half we really weren't on our game at all," Wallace said. "We played bad, and only scored six points in the second quarter. That's not us at all. In the second half, we really changed it up, started hitting our shots, getting to the hole, driving, and kicking. That's really the story of the game."

Wallace and Randolph attract a lot of attention when they're on the court. Wallace is 6-foot-7-inches and Randolph is 6-foot-8-inches. NFC pressured the duo heavily in the first, but in the second, the two began to push back. Randolph in particular ran into traffic, which set him up at the line multiple times in the second half.

"I was just being overall aggressive," Wallace said. "My shots weren't falling so I only had one option: get to the hole. I tried to get there as much as possible and if I missed a layup, Jaquay is right behind me to get the putback. That's was basically the strategy."

Maclay is confident in what it can become, but it knows that it needs to put in the work in order to get there. The Marauders have debatably one of the tallest teams in the area and are working with a lot of experience. Granger said putting that all together will take a few games before chemistry is found.

The Marauders' have the weekend off before jumping into a busy and competitive schedule. They have four games next week at St. John Paul II (12/7), hosting Rickards (12/8), hosting Florida High (12/9), and at Crossroads Academy (12/11).

"It's going to take a few games to get used to each other," Wallace said. "Guys are still coming off the football field and guys that we're hurt and still haven't played with each other. Today is the first day we played with everyone. It's the first time these guys have been altogether at once."

Despite there needing some work to be done, there is a lot of confidence inside this Marauder squad and what they can do.

"We've could've beat this team by a lot more, but we weren't making our shots and just we're making a lot of mistakes," Wallace said. "When we get our chemistry together more, we're going to be so much better. We're going to be the best team in the city."

Lessons in the loss

The Eagles basketball team has a very similar look and feel to the football team. Outside of the majority of the players splitting time between the hardwood and gridiron, both teams are extremely athletic but young.

One of its bigger pieces junior guard Traylon Ray was all over the court. He would score 28 of NFC's 45 points, which included a dunk in the first half. Ray is an important piece in the Eagles' process, but Eagles head coach Brad Bristol said he wants to get the ball moving a little more and take some of the pressure off of Ray.

"We've just got to get better at being more patient and doing one extra pass," Bristol said. "We just need to communicate better and not just settle. Unfortunately, we don't have practice tomorrow, so we're just going to have to go mentally through that and challenge ourselves to play a little better basketball."

Patience was a big thing for NFC as well as Bristol said the Eagles needed to work on their shot selection. NFC's offense went cold in the second and third quarters, combing for only eight points between the two periods. NFC found a push in the fourth quarter off an aggressive attack, seeing Ray down 18 of his 28 points in that stretch.

The Eagles had small runs but just fell short of a lead. They got close in the fourth quarter, cutting Maclay's lead down the three, but the Marauders would respond with back-to-back layups to re-pad the lead.

NFC has a quick turnaround, traveling out to Wakulla Friday night. The War Eagles are coming off a loss, falling to Franklin County by nine on Tuesday. Bristol knows that his team is athletic, but the lesson he wants them to learn heading into another matchup is that they need to go beyond that in order to win.

His team has displayed a hardworking mentality early on and he believes they can apply that lesson into their game.

"We've been talking since the first day of practice that it's no secret that we're pretty athletic, but you can't rely 32 minutes on your athleticism," Bristol said. "It'll be fine. We've just got to grow a little bit. They're eager to learn and willing to work hard, and that's a good thing."

"The lessons are we can't trust that one individual is going to change things. It's going to be more hands touching the ball and everybody's got to be more involved."

Jack Williams covers prep sports for Tallahassee Democrat. Contact him via email at jwilliams@tallahassee.com, on Twitter @jackgwilliams, or over phone at 701-270-1075.

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Maclay tops rival North Florida Christian as both teams strive for more