A pair of new head coaches got their first underwater immersion into the Williamson County rivalry between Marion and Herrin during Tuesday night's session of the Pyramid Plus boys basketball tournament at Cuss Wilson Gymnasium. This particular chapter saw the host Wildcats race out to a big first-half lead and beat the Tigers, 60-45, in front of a large crowd that had a decent amount of neutral observers who simply wanted to see a good catfight. "It had that feel to it," said Marion first-year coach Gus Gillespie. "Just a different attitude among the players and fans. That's what makes high school sports special." Herrin struck first with a 3-pointer by Bronson Nesler, who hit six of them on the night, and Marion's first points came on a runout slam dunk by Jaden Lacy. It was on quickly. "It's a great rivalry," said Herrin rookie coach Sayler Shurtz. "There was a great atmosphere tonight. You could see both communities really care about the game of basketball and right from the top we were going at it. It was very fun to be a part of it." Herrin led 7-4 after Nesler's second trey and Marion went on a 23-1 run after that with scoring coming from everywhere. Terrell Henderson, David Fletcher and Jackson Connor scored. Jordan Hollis scored. Lacy turned another steal into a layup. Cole Schafer bombed in a pair of 3-pointers and Justin Johnson got in on the fun as Marion took a 27-9 lead into halftime. "I felt like this summer I could tell we had good chemistry," Gillespie said. "It's carried on to the season. We have to get better at the foul line and do some things better defensively, but you're either selfish or unselfish and we're pretty unselfish." A three-point play by Johnson and a triple from Justin Saddoris gave the Wildcats a 46-22 lead going into the fourth quarter. Connor finished the game with 14 points and Lacy had a dozen. Saddoris and Johnson both had eight, Henderson had seven and Schafer six. "Both games we've had good balanced scoring and good sharing the basketball," Gillespie said. "That's fun to watch. It's not sticking in any one guy's hands. We're trying to share it and get it to the open guy." The Tigers (0-2) never rolled over and kept dropping in 3-pointers -- a total of 10 for the game -- but couldn't narrow the gap to single digits. Shurtz was much happier with his team Tuesday than he was after Monday's 63-27 loss to Collinsville. "We're obviously not happy with the end result on the scoreboard," Shurtz said, "but we're very happy with our play and how they fought until the end." Nesler ended up with a game-high 18 points and Drew Ringel had 10. Hayden Holloway chipped in seven for the Tigers, whose effort caught the eye of Gillespie.