Detroit Cass Tech's pressure eventually breaks Grand Blanc in Division 1 semifinal

EAST LANSING — Donning their pre-game “Press Tech” warm-up shirts, Detroit Cass Tech made it a full 36 minutes of hell for Grand Blanc in Friday’s Division 1 semifinal at Breslin Center.

The Technicians, with sophomore point guard Darius Acuff leading the way following a clutch banked-in 3-pointer with 2.5 seconds left in regulation, went on to win with an 8-2 run in overtime to oust the Bobcats, 62-56.

Acuff scored a game-high 19 points, and it was his two free throws with 40 seconds left in OT that gave Cass Tech a five-point cushion to seal the victory, placing the Technicians (26-1) in their first state final since 1974.

The 6-foot-2 Acuff, the Detroit Public School League’s Mr. Basketball, was quiet until the final stretches of the game after scoring 10 in the first half. He didn’t call “backboard” on the game-tying 35-footer, however, but he made no apologies if it was a lucky shot indeed.

WHO'S NUMBER 1?These are the best Michigan high school boys basketball programs of all time

“I knew it was going in, I knew it was going off the backboard,” he said. “And if I got open, I called for the ball, and when I got it, I knew I was going to shoot it. I knew it was going to go in.”

Grand Blanc (25-3), the 2021 champs and last year’s D1 runner-up, could not withstand Cass Tech’s relentless full-court pressure down the stretch after leading 54-51, with only 9.1 seconds following a pair of free throws by Robert Williams.

The Bobcats, who got a team-high 16 points from senior forward Tae Boyd, had 18 turnovers and missed three straight free throws in the final 1:15 of regulation.

Grand Blanc then went ice cold in the four-minute OT, going 1-for-8 from the field. They finished 36.4% for the game (20 of 55).

“They’re very active,” Grand Blanc first-year coach Tory Jackson said of the Technicians. “We’ve been on a roll with that team a few times at a few different showcases ... it’s not like we haven’t seen them before. We just didn’t handle the pressure. One of our keys on our offensive game scouting report was eliminating turnovers. And if you look up we have 18 turnovers. You won’t beat teams like that with that many turnovers.”

Cass Tech’s Kenneth Robertson added 15 points, while Corey Sadler Jr., a freshman guard, came off the bench to score 13 and came up with two key steals near the end of regulation.

“It’s toughness, it’s grit,” Hall said of Sadler Jr. “I got a team where’s there’s a lot of mix and match based on situation. I know when it’s a gut-check and it’s close, or when we need stops, and I knew I could count on it. In the third quarter that was the situation and I was happy how he played.”

Acuff’s game-tying shot came off a feed from Sadler after the Technicians had to go the length of the court following Williams’ two free throws. Acuff launched it from the top of the key and banked it home sending the Breslin crowd into a tizzy.

The fourth quarter proved to be wild and frenzied at times, but there was one constant throughout the fourth quarter and OT — Cass Tech’s constant pressure.

“We didn’t handle the pressure like we were supposed to,” Jackson said. “At times when we did, we went up. When we came back and took the lead, we relaxed. We couldn’t stay consistent with it and that was the frustrating part. We were up three, under 30 seconds and we talked about being disciplined, don’t let anybody get behind you. They got a full head of steam, hats off to them and Acuff is a tough player, one of the best players we played all year.”

Robertson scored six straight points to open the third quarter as the Technicians went up 32-25, but the Bobcats’ Anthony Perdue stopped the mini-run with a 3-pointer from the wing.

And the Bobcats kept using a 14-3 run to go up 39-35 on a tip-in by Boyd with 2:40 to play in the quarter, but Sadler scored seven straight points of his own to put the Technicians back on top 41-39 with 1:45 to go.

It turned out to be a wild ending to the period with Cass Tech holding a 45-43 advantage.

The Technicians held the Bobcats’ top scorer, senior guard RJ Taylor (Northern Iowa), to nine points on 3 of 12 shooting, including just 1 of 4 from 3-point range.

“There’s a wide range of emotions right now,” Cass Tech coach Steve Hall said. “Happy to be still living and fighting for another day. Grand Blanc was a very difficult team to prepare for because of the dynamics of their team. R.J. Taylor (nine points) could be valuable without scoring. I knew I could control him from a scoring standpoint, but he creates for other people. I had to determine if I would double him and get the ball out of his hands because he’s dynamic and trying to help others . . especially in the closing moments of the game. They were difficult to prepare for but the guys carried out the game plan to a ‘T.’”

Meanwhile, Grand Blanc reached Breslin for the third straight year. The Bobcats have one state title and a runner-up finish.

“It’s definitely not the way we wanted to go out,” said Boyd, a football standout who also grabbed 10 rebounds. “Looking back at it, it’s been a journey ... I feel a lot of people would trade their careers with what they’ve done for what we’ve done. It’s a standard we’ve helped set.”

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit Cass Tech's pressure breaks Grand Blanc in Division 1