MANHATTAN — Taylor Euler could have played hero.
Two weeks ago, his coach knows he would have tried. And on this night, who would have blamed him? Euler was playing the game of his life in the first half on Friday in Manhattan, scoring 16 points and carrying the Spartans on his back.
So when Manhattan focused its defense on stopping Euler in the second half and took the lead and momentum in the process, all eyes were on Euler. What they witnessed was the evolution of a senior point guard.
Euler let his teammates make the comeback, made the go-ahead 3-pointer when he got the chance and helped close the game at the free throw line. He scored a career-high 28 points, and Emporia won its third straight game, 53-49.
“Taylor in the last two weeks has matured so much as a complete basketball player that anybody could be proud of,” EHS coach Rick Bloomquist said. “Four weeks ago, Taylor would have tried to be the hero, and we would have lost by 10 points. In the last few weeks, the changes we’ve made... it’s so fun to watch how they’ve evolved as a team.”
On Feb. 17 when EHS gave Topeka West its only Centennial League win, the Spartans were on everyone’s March wish-list. After responding to that embarrassing loss by winning three straight, Emporia (11-9, 8-5) enters substate with the same record as last year’s team that made a run to the State tournament.
The Spartans are now a team that no one should want to play, and they might have needed the Topeka West loss to make the transformation.
At that time, Bloomquist had a meeting with Euler and also with his team. Euler had become trigger-happy from the perimeter and Bloomquist wanted him to change the way he was playing.
“Coach sat down with me and talked to me and said, ‘For you to be at your best, you’ve got to be the kind of point guard that’s slashing and making everyone else better instead of just hunting for 3-pointers,’” Euler said. “I really took that to heart, because I want this team to go as far as we can. It’s my last year so I’m just trying right now to get to the basket, and I have confidence that whoever is guarding me can’t stop me and if they are going to double team me, then I’m going to hit the open man and try to get some easy buckets out of it.”
Euler showed his change in approach in the first half against the Indians. He turned down several open 3-pointers and slashed to the basket or pulled up for midrange jumpers. He made 8-of-11 shots in the first half and his team led 22-16 at halftime.
Manhattan (10-10, 6-7) made sure someone other than Euler took the shots in the second half. Euler got off only two shots in the third quarter — making one — and Manhattan took a 32-29 lead into the fourth quarter.
The Indians opened the fourth quarter on a 5-0 run to take an eight-point lead, and Bloomquist called timeout.
“I could see it in their eyes. They wanted to give up,” Bloomquist said. “When we called that timeout and we talked a little bit in the huddle, I think they saw in my eyes what they saw a couple days ago in practice, and they didn’t want to go back. I wanted toughness. That’s what I wanted.”
Toughness was the theme behind Bloomquist’s message after the Topeka West loss, and what he witnessed next was what he’s been searching for all season.
The Spartans came out of the timeout and switched to a man-to-man defense and increased their aggressiveness on offense by taking the ball to the basket. Bryce Childs started the rally by scoring on a putback. Jacob Torres drove to the basket, missed, grabbed his own rebound and was fouled. He made both free throws.
On the following possession, the Spartans played volleyball around the rim until Greg Canales finally finished on the team’s fifth try. Torres, who struggled in the first half, tied the game with a strong drive to the basket.
“After the big first half Taylor had, they were going to lock on him more. We had to go to me or Greg,” Torres said.
As the Spartans made the comeback, Euler played facilitator and let his teammates do the scoring.
“If they want to guard me like that, we’ll just play four on four. Nobody is hurt by that. I don’t have to do the scoring for this team to be successful,” Euler said. “There are four other guys out there that are very capable of playing basketball and scoring buckets without me.”
Euler was rewarded for his patience. With the game tied at 37, Euler dribbled around a ball screen and was wide open at the top of the key, and with 3:01 left in the game, he made his only 3-pointer of the night to put the Spartans ahead.
After Canales added to the lead with a free throw, the Spartans got another stop and Euler used a hesitation dribble to get past his defender and found Canales for the Spartans’ final field goal with 1:32 left.
From there, it became a free throw shooting contest, and the Spartans made 10-of-12 in the final 1:03. They needed all 10, as the Indians made four straight 3-pointers. They closed to within one point at 50-49, but after Euler made two free throws, they could not get off a good look and Colton Rohr missed a fade-away desperation 3-pointer that would have tied the game.
The Spartans showed poise in the fourth quarter, not committing one turnover and making 15-of-18 free throws to pull off the comeback and keep the Indians from pulling off their own comeback.
“Two or three weeks ago, we wouldn’t have won this game. That’s the thing that I see with how we win this game,” Bloomquist said. “They made that run and we’ve had that happen to us all year. All year we’ve panicked. All year we try to just bring us back ourselves, try to come back individually. Tonight was such a great team effort. We battled together, and we haven’t done that all year. We just started doing this and we needed this game to finish off what we’ve been trying to accomplish as far as toughness.”
Torres scored eight of his 10 points in the final 10 minutes and also had nine rebounds. Canales finished with eight points and five rebounds. Euler had two assists to go along with his career-high 28 points.
Emporia boys 53, Manhattan 49
Emporia 12 10 7 24 — 53
Manhattan 8 8 16 17 — 49
Emporia (11-9, 8-5) — Euler 10-14 7-10 28, Torres 3-10 4-4 10, Canales 3-10 2-4 8, Childs 2-4 0-0 4, Essex 1-1 0-0 2, Jamison 0-1 0-0 0, Gentz 0-2 1-2 1. Totals 19-42 14-19 53.
Manhattan (10-10, 6-7) — McCarthy 1-5 0-0 3, Rohr 3-11 0-0 8, Stitt 6-8 0-0 17, Wilkinson 0-4 1-2 1, Hanson 2-6 2-3 5, Reed 2-4 2-4 6, Thornton 1-1 0-0 3, Nelson 1-3 0-0 3. Totals 16-42 5-9 49.
3-point goals — Emporia 1-9 (Euler 1-3, Childs 0-2, Torres 0-4), Manhattan 10-24 (Stitt 5-7, Rohr 2-7, Thornton 1-1, Nelson 1-3, McCarthy 1-3, Wilkinson 0-3). Rebounds — Emporia 31 (Torres 9), Manhattan 25 (Reed 6). Fouled out — None.