ROCHESTER HILLS — Dearborn Divine Child’s first defeat of the year came at the hands of Detroit Loyola, and the Falcons needed overtime to get by the Bulldogs in the mid-season rematch. But when it mattered most, Divine Child was in control throughout the Cardinal Division championship contest Feb. 14 at Oakland University.
Divine Child’s statement 69-50 win ended nearly a half-century of hard-court frustration, as the Falcons nabbed their first Catholic League basketball championship since 1977.
“It’s crazy, but we believed we could come out here and win it, so it was not too crazy,” Divine Child junior Malik Bush said. “Before the game, we all sat down and talked and came together. It was kind of an all-around attack. We had to lock in defensively, we all just played together, played well as a team, and that’s what got it done.”
While Bush’s 13 points were a vital part of a balanced scoring attack for Divine Child (19-2, 11-1 AA Division), head coach Eric Evans said good things happened when the Falcons turned up the intensity at the opposite end of the court.
“(Loyola is) really physical, really well coached. They’ve got a great group of guys who play really hard, and we always know we’ve got to match their intensity,” he said. “I thought tonight we came out and matched their intensity and we were able to keep it rolling.”
“Really, it was just our approach,” Richard Holland said. “We knew we had a target on our back. We know how people come in to every game when they play us, and we just take that with a chip on our shoulder and we come in and fight hard. It showed tonight.”
Loyola (17-4, 10-2) only led on two occasions — both in the opening four minutes — until Bush’s lay-up drive, plus a resulting bonus free throw, put the Falcons in front. And they didn’t look back: Divine Child was up 36-28 by halftime, and put the game away with a 15-4 advantage in the third quarter to go up by 19 points.
“I think the third quarter hasn’t been really great for us all the way through the season, so that’s something we talked about in the locker room (at halftime), coming out the first four minutes and really playing our type of basketball,” Evans said. “We came out and did that, and that was the difference. Today we did it when it mattered.”
Loyola coach Dennis Morey could only watch as Divine Child pulled away in the second half.
“We didn’t do a great job on the glass like we did in the past games, and with our size, it’s kind of disappointing,” he said. “When we allowed them to get the rebounds, they did a great job of pushing and getting ahead. Our transition (defense) was pretty bad, so that allowed them to get easy buckets on us. They’ve got quick guards with good size, and they used that to their advantage.”
Loyola was led by Martez Davis, who scored 13 points. D’Andre Dann had 12. Besides the 13 from Bush, Divine Child got a game-high 14 from Denham Butler, 12 from Holland (12) and 10 by Joseph Arnold.
“Credit goes to the guys; they put the work in,” Evans said. “We set goals early on in the year. We said we wanted to win the league outright in the regular season and go out and win the conference tournament. We worked every day for those goals, and we ended up getting it done today.”
As a former assistant coach, Evans had helped guide Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice to a Catholic League title in 2022-23. But he said the thrill of that didn’t measure up to what transpired last Saturday.
“That was really special (three years ago), man, but to do it with my own program for our community, this feels amazing,” he said. “It was really great to do it for this community, this school and this program, because they’ve showed me so much love since the day I got here.”
