Marcus Paige and the Linn-Mar Lions put on a spectacular show Friday night before an adoring home crowd.

The Xavier Saints, who nearly upset the Lions two weeks ago, were the unfortunate victims.

Paige tossed in 29 points and added a sensational dunk to his highlight reel as the sixth-ranked Lions demolished the Saints, 67-34, in a Mississippi Valley Conference blowout at Linn-Mar.

The Lions (13-3, 9-2) led by 43 points late in the third quarter with one of their best overall performances of the season.

"Collectively I think this was probably one of the top two games we've played this year," said Paige. "Everybody came out ready to go. We've been coming out flat a lot the last five or six games, so it was good that we came out ready to play today."

Linn-Mar overwhelmed the Saints at the beginning and raced to a commanding 28-9 bulge after the first period with stingy defense, strong rebounding and sharp shooting.

It was a tremendous start, the team's best in quite some time.

"I didn't see that coming," said Linn-Mar Coach Chris Robertson. "We've really tried to focus on getting off to better starts. I don't know what the magic formula is.

"You can talk about it until you're blue in the face. For whatever reason we came out ready to play."

The latest entry in the Paige highlight reel came midway through the second quarter. He leaped high at midcourt to steal a pass and fed Jimmy Roth for an easy layup, but Roth glanced back at Paige and had other ideas.

Instead of taking the easy points, Roth appeared to grin and waited for Paige to catch up. At that point, everybody in the house knew what was coming.

Roth tossed the ball above the rim and Paige soared high to get it, twisted his body in mid-air and dunked with his back to the basket. The crowd loved it.

"All I was thinking was, 'I hope I make it,'" Paige confessed later, laughing. "It would have been bad if I missed."

Roth was happy to defer to a star.

"I could see see him running with his finger pointing up. That means alley-oop and I just gave it to him," said Roth, reliving the play. "You've GOT to give it to him."

Paige appreciated the gesture.

"That just shows how unselfish he is," said Paige. "Obviously he could have taken the layup. He saw me coming and wanted to get the team pumped up a little bit.

"I wasn't really sure what he was going to do. I knew it was just me and him. When he got under the basket and kind of looked at me, I could tell he was going to throw it."

Robertson saw the play develop from the bench.

"I saw Marcus start to really go," he said. "I saw him kind of make eye contact (with Roth). I had a feeling it was coming.

"That's a nice unselfish play," said Robertson. "We might talk about that, though. Maybe it's better to go shoot the layup, but we'll let him enjoy it tonight."

Paige put on a remarkable one-man show last week when he scored a school-record 46 points in a comeback win against Prairie, but Friday night's victory over Xavier was a complete team victory. All the starters got into the act and made key contributions.

Zach Martins hit a pair of 3-pointers in the opening minutes, Roth drilled a 3-pointer and Andy Henry scored to give Linn-Mar a quick 11-4 advantage. At that point, Paige had barely broken a sweat.

Derik Gogg, a 6-foot-8 stringbean, blocked a couple of shots at the start of the game to key the defense and the Lions also controlled the backboards, with Gogg snaring 11 caroms in the first half alone.

All of that was bad enough for the Saints, but then Paige got into the act and it was Katie bar the door. He notched 17 points in the next 13 minutes and the Lions owned a 43-17 advantage at halftime, with Paige matching Xavier's entire output in the first two quarters.

"They played well all-around. It wasn't just one guy," said Xavier Coach Matt Jenkins. "Marcus got guys open early and found those guys, and he got himself going. It just opened up everything, where you have to pay attention to everybody."

Linn-Mar ignited the continuous clock when it took a 35-point lead at 52-17 with five minutes left in the third quarter, but the Lions didn't stop there. They scored the first 14 points of the second half to make it 57-17 on a three-point play by Paige.

Paige gave the Lions a 41-point bulge at 59-18 with a routine (for him) dunk on a lob from Nate Dick, and Jon Schlotterback gave Linn-Mar a 43-point advantage at 61-18 with two free throws late. At that point Paige had outscored the Saints, 27-18, with 1:19 left in the third quarter.

Robertson pulled all his starters with 5:37 left in the game with Linn-Mar sitting on a 65-27 cushion. At that point, Paige had outscored the Saints 29-27 when he sat down for good.

Paige leads Class 4A in scoring at 28 points per game and appears to be well on his way to winning the "Mr. Basketball" award in Iowa this season.

"Everybody should sit back and enjoy him, because players like that don't come around that often," said Robertson. "He's unique and he's special in his own way. I think people are seeing a superstar in the making. It's nice to have him on our side."

The game was a complete reversal from their first meeting. Xavier led the Lions with a few minutes remaining when they met at Xavier just two weeks ago, but Paige and the Lions rallied for a 70-61 victory that night by scoring the last 11 points of the game.

This time, the Saints (6-11, 5-7) never had a chance.

"Get back to work," said Jenkins, sitting in the visitor's locker room. "Can't dwell on this one."

Gogg finished with 12 rebounds, eight points and four blocked shots for the Lions. Henry scored 10 points.

Ben McDermott led the Saints with 10 points. Nobody else scored more than four points for Xavier. Alec Clasen missed the game with a sprained ankle.

The continuous clock was supposed to stop after Xavier chopped the deficit under 35 points at 65-31, but nobody seemed to care and the game mercifully ended a few minutes later.

XAVIER (34): Sampson 0 0-0 0, McDermott 4 1-2 10, Hosch 1 0-0 2, Valentine 2 0-0 4, Mattke 2 0-0 4, Ropp 1 0-0 2, Nelson 2 0-0 4, Frazier 0 3-3 3, Mullin 1 1-2 3, Schulte 1 0-0 2, Woods 0 0-0 0, Thinnes 0 0-0 0, Brown 0 0-0 0, Breitbach 0 0-0 0, Foxhoven 0 0-0 0. Totals 14 5-7 34.

LINN-MAR (67): Martins 2 0-0 6, Roth 3 0-0 7, Gogg 4 0-0 8, Henry 4 2-2 10, Paige 12 3-4 29, Meier 1 0-0 3, Dick 0 0-0 0, Schlotterback 0 2-2 2, Hutchins 0 0-0 0, Wick 0 0-0 0, Nelson 1 0-0 2, Mortensen 0 0-0 0, Sloterdyk 0 0-0 0, Holland 0 0-0 0, Richardson 0 0-0 0, Hackett 0 0-0 0, Manternach 0 0-0 0. Totals 27 7-8 67.

Halftime - Linn-Mar 43, Xavier 17. 3-point goals - Xavier 1 (McDermott 1), Linn-Mar 6 (Martins 2, Paige 2, Roth 1, Meier 1).