Jefferson Coach Stu Ordman watched Davenport Central warm up Tuesday night and sensed the J-Hawks could be in trouble.

"They're athletic," he said with an apprehensive smile a few minutes before tipoff.

The Blue Devils were athletic and very good.

Davenport Central thumped the No. 9 J-Hawks, 67-48, in a non-conference game at the Jefferson gym.

The Blue Devils (9-2) featured a strong 1-2 punch of point guard Demetrius Butler and 6-foot-7 center Zach Burnham, who combined for 37 points to hand Jefferson (9-3) its worst loss of the season.

The J-Hawks led at halftime, 26-23, but the visitors poured in 44 points in the second half and steadily pulled away.

"We played a nice game tonight," Davenport Central Coach Craig Wurdinger said. "I told them after the game, if they play like that every game we could do some damage."

Butler, a 6-foot senior, is being recruited by Kirkwood Community College, among others. Burnham has committed to Coppin State, a Division I school in Maryland, and they were too much for the J-Hawks. Butler scored 20 points and Burnham netted 17.

The Blue Devils were a tough matchup for Jefferson, which doesn't have much size and has to rely on pinpoint execution, team defense and good shooting to win games.

"I think Davenport Central could be a tough matchup for a lot of teams," Ordman said. "They're well-coached and they played very well, particularly in the second half tonight.

"I still think we can do things that would give them trouble, but we don't have that much margin of error. We've got to execute.

"We don't have a 6-foot-7 D-1 player who can maybe clean up some things. We don't have some of the athleticism they have, so we have got to execute every possession of the game offensively and defensively. If we do, we can make things interesting."

Davenport Central outscored the J-Hawks 21-8 in the third quarter to grab control, then outscored them again 23-14 in the final stanza to finish the job.

Jefferson senior Alec Saunders played well on defense against Burnham in the first half despite giving away seven inches and outscored him, 11-6, in the opening two periods. The J-Hawks ran into problems in the second half, however.

"Our shot selection was terrible. Just terrible," Ordman said. "I was really surprised."

Even when the J-Hawks took good shots, they usually went astray. And they sprung major leaks on defense.

"We had some guys who were a step slow on defense tonight," Ordman remarked. "These guys can really punish you if you do that. We had all sorts of problems."

Taylor Olson led Jefferson with 18 points, but he did not shoot well from the floor. Saunders finished with 13 points, scoring only two points in the second half.

Once Davenport Central took the lead, the hole kept getting deeper and deeper for the J-Hawks.

"The thing that disappoints me the most is we never reached back to get that extra energy to make a good run," Ordman said. "It's very disturbing to me, and we'll certainly shake things up in the next couple of practices and see if we can clean that up."

DAVENPORT CENTRAL (67): Butler 6 7-8 20, Corbin 1 2-3 4, Case 4 0-0 9, T. Smith 4 0-0 8, Burnham 7 3-5 17, Z. Smith 1 2-2 5, Light 0 1-2 1, Gowey 0 0-0 0, Cook 0 0-0 0, Davis 0 0-0 0, Warren 1 0-0 3. Totals 24 15-20 67.

JEFFERSON (48): Robinson 1 0-0 2, Olson 7 4-4 18, Saunders 4 3-4 13, Kramer 2 0-0 6, Hemphill 1 0-0 3, Underwood 3 0-0 6, Sullivan 0 0-0 0, Mueller 0 0-0 0, Goodell 0 0-0 0, Knox 0 0-0 0. Totals 18 7-8 48.

Halftime - Jefferson 26, Davenport Central 23. 3-point goals - Davenport Central 4 (Butler 1, Case 1, Z. Smith 1, Warren 1), Jefferson 5 (Saunders 2, Kramer 2, Hemphill 1).