Marion shoots down Herrin at Mid-Winter Classic

WEST FRANKFORT -- Justin Saddoris bombined in six 3-pointers and scored 29 points to lead Marion High School's boys basketball team to a 69-41 rout of Herrin during Friday night's session of the 32nd annual West Frankfort Mid-Winter Classic at Max Morris Gymnasium.
Marion is now 13-6 and will play either Anna-Jonesboro or Eldorado in the tournament's third-place game at 7:30 p.m. Saturday night.
Anna-Jonesboro plays Eldorado in the morning session, which was delayed from Monday, with the winner meeting Cairo in the championship and the loser playing Marion.
Friday's renewal of a long-standing Williamson County rivalry was tight early on. Marion led 16-13 after one quarter and was up 22-13 after Saddoris converted a three-point play, but Herrin used a pair of treys by Bronson Nesler from the right corner to tie the game at 22-all with 2:24 left in the half.
But then Saddoris sank a pair of triples of his own, Jaden Lacy brought the gym alive with a huge block of Brandon Anthony and David Fletcher canned one of his three treys to help the Wildcats go into the break with a 32-25 lead.
Marion closed the first half on a 10-3 run, then opened the second half with an even better 17-2 run -- that's a game-changing 27-5 span -- to blow things open.
The big run in the third quarter included two more 3-pointers by Saddoris, three-point plays by Jackson Connor and Terrell Henderson and another long bomb by Fletcher that made it 49-27.
Marion's lead was 51-30 going into the fourth and both Saddoris and Fletcher hit triples and Connor put in a pair of baskets to help push the lead to the 30-point mark and invoke a running clock.
Connor finished with 11 points and both Fletcher and Henderson had nine. Lacy added four, while Mitchell Jackson and Kobe Tucker both had three points late and Cole Schafer had one point.
Cameron Vaughn led Herrin with 15 points and Nesler had nine.
Saturday morning's session also features Carterville playing Herrin and West Frankfort playing Christopher, with those results determining who plays who in the first two games of the night session.