Loyola fell into a big hole early, struggled from the three-point line and is still getting two-sport athletes from the state championship football team acclimated to basketball.
None of that mattered on Friday night, when the No. 25 Ramblers clawed their way back from 12 points down in the third quarter to beat St. Ignatius 40-37 in the Jesuit Cup game at Gentile Arena.
Andrew Hollerich scored a game-high 17 points for Loyola (7-2, 1-1 Catholic Blue), which is 10-1 in the last 11 Jesuit Cup meetings. Miles Boland added 10 points and five rebounds.
“This is the biggest game for us in the regular season,” Hollerich said. “This is the game we always look forward to and we prepare the most to play this game.”
Despite that, the Ramblers were down 11-0 to start the game, committing four turnovers before they scored a point.
There was no panic on the Loyola side though.
“You know what, we were really calm,” Ramblers coach Tom Livatino said. “[We said], ‘We’ve gotta figure it out.’ And they figured it out.
“So credit to the guys. ... The seniors wear this game as a badge of honor. It’s a really important thing.”
Loyola crept within 15-13 and was down 20-16 at halftime. But St. Ignatius (5-3, 0-1) started the third quarter with a 7-0 run and was up 30-18 after Reggie Ray’s driving basket at 4:44 of the third.
Then the Ramblers’ defense took over. The Wolfpack went 10:39 without a field goal. Loyola took its first lead, 32-31, on Hollerich’s three-pointer from the left wing with 6:51 left in the game. The Ramblers led the rest of the way.
“In the second half we started trapping a little bit more, we sped up the tempo a little bit,” Livatino said.
The Ramblers also went 10 deep in their rotation, subbing frequently when they went from offense to defense and vice versa.
“Our football guys — the reason we’re going offense, defense sometimes, it’s because they don’t even know what they’re doing,” Livatino said. “They don’t even know our sets. So we’ve got a long way to go.”
Case in point: the Ramblers shot 3-for-18 from beyond the arc.
But the defense got the job done, allowing the Wolfpack six points in the fourth quarter.
“It’s just what we do,” Boland said. “That’s what we practice, what we preach. At the end of the day, that’s what we knew it was going to come down to.”
Ray had 15 points for St. Ignatius and Phoenix Gill added 10 points and six rebounds. Miami football commit Justin Scott grabbed eight rebounds.
“I don’t think they changed a lot [as the game went on],” Wolfpack coach Matt Monroe said of the Ramblers. “They just run their stuff really well. One big change is they went to their 1-3-1 ... and we were expecting it but we didn’t adjust well to it. But we also went away from some of the things that had gotten us the lead in the first place.”
