Henricksen: Marcus Garrett stars, Hillcrest shines at R-B Shootout

It was an opening 8 a.m. game of a summer shootout against Downers Grove South, but it didn’t take long to notice Hillcrest’s Marcus Garrett looking like his old self, playing comfortably and confident with his high school team at Riverside-Brookfield this past weekend.

By the time the first half was over, Garrett, a 6-1 combo guard, had 20 points en route to a 31-point performance in the first of three wins for Hillcrest on Saturday.

Those 20 points were nearly as many as he scored in 10 total games of EYBL action while playing with the Mac Irvin Fire this past spring. Garrett never did find his groove on the circuit.

In those 10 games in the highly competitive EYBL, Garrett played sparingly behind the Big Ten backcourt of Peoria Manual’s Da’Monte Williams (Illinois commit) and Milwaukee product Jordan Poole (Michigan commit). He averaged just seven minutes a game and scored a total of 22 points.

“It was challenging not getting a whole lot of minutes on the circuit,” Garrett said. “But I feel at home here [with Hillcrest] and comfortable.”

Garrett followed up a strong Saturday with some heroics on Sunday, leading Hillcrest to three more wins, including a 68-49 win over Morgan Park in the Riverside-Brookfield Shootout title game. The strong bodied guard pumped in 30 points in the championship game win.

Earlier in the day he scored 26 points in beating Evanston, including a game-tying three-pointer to send the game to overtime and a game-winning basket in OT. On the day, Garrett and the Hawks beat Kenwood, Evanston and Morgan Park in succession.

Garrett is a power packed scoring guard who gets to the rim, defends and plays with a motor.

“He’s the ultimate leader,” Hillcrest coach Don Houston says of Garrett, who averaged 18 points a game last season. “He’s hungry, and he’s forcing others to be hungry. He’s their leader. He will do anything for any coach he plays for.”

The title at R-B doesn’t come as a huge surprise. Houston returns a ton of experience and talent from last year’s team, starting with the return of Garrett and sophomore Isaac Stanback, who opened eyes last year as a freshman on the varsity.

There is also a pair of juniors who gained a ton of valuable experience last season –– Jalen Hughes and Robert Harvey, an athletic 6-3 scorer. Plus, senior Timmy Tyms provided some big contributions over the course of the weekend.

“I see they have started right where they left off from last season,” says Houston. “They didn’t miss a beat, so that’s a good place to start and build from. Now, we still have a ways to go and a lot to work on. But they maintained a lot from where we were at in March. I loved their effort.”

It’s just summer but Hillcrest does know this Morgan Park team will be one of its biggest obstacles standing in the way of the Hawks reaching Peoria next March. These two will undoubtedly be on a collision course nine months from now in Class 3A.

“They have grown, basketball wise, learning from what went wrong last year,” Houston points out. “It’s a tough group who play physical.”

Hillcrest lost in the sectional final to Lincoln-Way West last season and fell to Morgan Park in the super-sectional two years ago. Like Houston, Garrett says a lot was learned from that tough March sectional final loss.

“We learned from that Lincoln-Way West game and those last 90 seconds,” Garrett said of the sectional loss, where Hillcrest was outscored 11-0 to close out the 61-56 loss. “We just have to keep working. We are tough, physical and we grind.”

Follow Joe Henricksen and the Hoops Report at @joehoopsreport