Myles Lowe had an assignment last season for Burlington Central while he was sitting behind Drew Scharnowski, who is now playing Division I men’s basketball at Belmont.
Every day, Lowe’s task was to go up against Scharnowski in practice, and that has prepared the 6-foot-7 senior forward to take on a much larger role this season for the Rockets.
Putting in the work has worked out well.
“We told him it was going to help his game,” Burlington Central coach Brett Porto said of Lowe. “Toward the end of the year in practice, if people could come watch, he did such a good job against him defensively and even offensively.
“We felt pretty good that he could line himself up for a pretty nice senior year.”
Forget the lows for Lowe. He was at a high point Friday night, putting together his best varsity performance in a 52-40 Fox Valley Conference win over rival Hampshire.
Lowe tied a career best with a game-high 24 points for the Rockets (7-3, 5-2). He added five rebounds and four blocked shots. Jake Johnson added 19 points, six rebounds and five steals. Hampshire (6-6, 4-3) was paced by 11 points from Ryan Regalado.
Lowe said he took full advantage of his apprenticeship under Scharnowski right up until game time Friday.
“He’s helped me a lot with modeling my game,” Lowe said. “(Friday), I literally went back and watched last year’s Hampshire film and sorted through all of Drew’s plays, how he was able to score.
“A lot of that comes from just studying Drew and being able to see the mismatch and get into position.”
Lowe showed off a lot of his offensive arsenal during a 10-point second quarter, which helped the Rockets take a 24-23 halftime lead.
He started that quarter by hitting a 16-footer. He had three layups, one of them a basket off a rebound, and put in a shot off a spin move in the lane to end the first half.
In the fourth quarter, Lowe even made a 3-pointer as the Rockets pulled away.
“He’s hit some big fourth-quarter shots for us, too, in a lot of games,” Porto said. “He’s taken the challenge and wants the ball in his hands in the fourth quarter, and that’s great to see.”
After a sluggish third quarter, the Rockets expanded the lead. Johnson and Lowe each scored seven points in a 14-4 run to start the fourth that created a 46-34 lead.
“It was definitely our defense,” Lowe said. “We struggled offensively with turnovers in the third quarter, but defensively we went on a long streak without allowing a bucket and that’s when we were able to pull away.”
Hampshire’s last lead was 28-26 in the third. Coach Mike Featherly lamented not taking better advantage of six turnovers in that quarter.
“I thought a lot of little things added up,” Featherly said. “We played hard. We just didn’t get those stops and couldn’t convert.”
Johnson scored 11 in the fourth to put the game away for the Rockets.
“We talk about now that he draws more coverage than he has the last couple years, just being a scorer,” Porto said. “It might be free throws. It might be steals. It doesn’t have to be a three-pointer.
“Just find a way at the end of the night to fill the stats, and that’s what he did.”
Lowe said, meanwhile, said he knew his role was going to expand dramatically this winter. Working on that was his offseason focus.
“A lot of it is a mentality of knowing you have to be the guy on the team scoring a lot of points,” Lowe said. “That’s part of it. I definitely worked on being stronger with the ball.”
Paul Johnson is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.
