Two dominant guards in Ezequeil Cosme and Nesta Rice are getting ready to go toe-to-toe. The Mastery Warrior will take on the Medford Tech Jaguars on Thursday.
Last Wednesday, Mastery was within striking distance but couldn't close the gap as they fell 48-42 to Cherry Hill West. While losing is never fun, the Warrior can't take it too hard given the team's big disadvantage in MaxPreps' New Jersey basketball rankings (they are ranked 437th, while the Lions are ranked 115th).
Meanwhile, winning is always nice, but doing so behind a season-high score is even better (just ask Medford Tech). They had just enough and edged out Cinnaminson 81-79. The Jaguars haven't had any issues with the Pirates recently, as the game was their third consecutive win against them.
Mastery better focus on containing Tyler Branson and Rice as the pair were huge in Medford Tech's win. Branson went 8-for-17 to rack up 28 points in addition to six rebounds and six steals, while Rice went 12-for-28 en route to 40 points and eight boards. That makes it three consecutive games in which Rice has scored at least a third of Medford Tech's points. The team also got some help courtesy of Kweli Jackson, who posted seven points.
Medford Tech pushed their record up to 13-10 with the victory, which was their ninth straight on the road. The wins came thanks in part to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they averaged 66.1 points over those games. As for Mastery, their defeat dropped their record down to 10-8.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
