How Luther shut down a prolific scorer who accomplished state feat no other could in 107 years

His 51 points was the first 50-point game by an individual at state, and he did it six days after scoring 42 points in the sectional final against Kohler to give Kenosha St. Joseph its first state appearance in 20 years.

Luther knew it had to find a way to bottle the 6-foot junior guard who scored 93 points on 42 shots in his previous two games.

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Coach Brad Schaper said Kenesie “rises above everything,” but their game plan, created by defensive coordinator Jimmy Schwichtenberg, was to defend Kenesie with Isaiah Schwichtenberg and Kodi Miller who were “up on the perimeter did everything they could to keep Kenesie in front of them.”

“We needed to keep square shoulders and not get off balance by letting him flow because he likes to flow through that lane and penetrate,” Schaper said. “(Isaiah Scwichtenberg’s) dedication to wanting to play defense is beyond any player I’ve ever seen at any level. He’s going to be very successful next year because he’s willing to play defense and pass the ball.”

It resulted in a 60-46 Luther victory for the Division 4 state championship after it held Kenesie to 18 points on as many shots.

He entered the state tournament averaging 21.9 points per game on 49.5% shooting.

“We knew they were going to try to get the ball out of his hand,” St. Joseph’s coach Jose Garcia said. “I told my coaching staff since the playoffs started that’s what I thought they would do. A lot of those teams didn’t do it.

“We knew this one would probably do it and they got the ball out of his hand. We made the proper plays in the first half and withstood their punch and got back in the game, and finished off a good first half.”

Isaiah Schwichtenberg did his job of containing Kenesie, who works hard off the ball. He said he had to trust his teammates to do their job to double up Kenesie.

“He’s going to look for three or four screens after he passes it,” Isaiah Schwichtenberg said. “Being able to watch him through and follow him, so we don’t lose him. We lost him a couple of times and that’s when he got his buckets. I think in the second half, we did a better job of finding where he was at.”

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Kenesie said he was still confident the entire game, but “it was tough.”

“They were face-guarding me a little bit,” Kenesie said. “It was hard to get the ball. I think we made the right decisions, trusting our teammates not just relying on me. I thought even though it was hard to get me the ball, my teammates, I trusted them and it was just the best we could do.”