Enemies, yet still friends

For the last eight years Craig Teagle and Ryan VanSkyock roamed the same sideline together.
They built a lasting friendship on and off the basketball court.
Tonight, they will be back on the sidelines together — as opposing coaches.
Jay County High School’s boys basketball team hits the road to take on VanSkyock and his Delta Eagles at 7:30 p.m. tonight.
“Obviously I want him to be successful, he coached under us,” said Teagle, Jay County’s longtime coach. “There is one game though every year I won’t want him to be successful and that’s (tonight).”
For VanSkyock, who is three games into his first season leading the Eagles, stepping onto the court tonight will have a strange feeling.
“It’s weird,” said VanSkyock, who played for Teagle and then spent nearly a decade as his protégé. “I’m very appreciative of the things I learned from him. It’s going to be a weird 32 minutes of basketball.”
Delta and Jay County are two different teams.
After losing the first two games of the season — 50-32 to Pendleton Heights and 54-42 to Winchester — VanSkyock got his first coaching victory Friday against Cowan, 48-28.
Jay County has won each of its first three games — a 43-40 overtime win at home against Muncie Central, a 59-27 thumping of Lakewood Park and a road conference win against defending Allen County Athletic Conference champion Woodlan, 50-32.
While Jay County is an older team, Delta relies mostly on its youngsters. The Patriots have three seniors in their starting lineup while the Eagles have a trio of sophomores.
The only similarity between the two teams — which may come as no surprise — is coaching style. “Coach V” utilizes a similar offense to what Jay County runs, laden with ball screens, curls and flares to get open looks.
“We’re going to be familiar with what they’re trying to do with their system and he’s going to be very familiar with our system,” said Teagle. “We’ve ran the same thing for 17 years. We just try to out-execute the opponent.
“It isn’t what you do, it’s how you do it.”
And the Patriots have been effective this season at executing offensively.
Junior big man Adam Dirksen is the Patriots’ leading scorer with 15.3 points per game. He tallied 13 points against Muncie Central before exploding for a career-high 20 against Lakewood Park. His partner in the post, sophomore Jay Houck, is averaging 11.7 points per game.
Senior Justin Dirksen — Adam’s older brother — emerged as a scoring threat against Woodlan, as he dropped a career-high 16 points in the Patriots’ first ACAC victory. Combined, the Dirksens and Houck make up more than 70 percent of the Patriots’ points.
Adam Dirksen and Houck have also been making their presence known on the defensive side of the court, averaging 7.3 and 5.3 rebounds apiece. The former is also averaging nearly four blocks per game, and has tallied five in each of the Patrtiots’ last two victories.
Kameron Slaven leads the way for the Eagles as the only player to average double figures. The senior, who was an Indiana Basketball Coaches Association Top 100 player in the summer, averages 10.7 points per game. Tanner Lamber (8.6 PPG) and Kaleb Slaven (4.7 PPG) are the No. 2 and No. 3 scorers respectively. Unfortunately for the Eagles, they will be without its leading rebounder, Matt Norris, who has been suspended five games for a violation of team rules.
The success of the Eagles’ offense, VanSkyock said, is dependent on Kameron Slaven.
“We have a hard time scoring if he doesn’t score,” said VanSkyock.
Teagle is hoping Slaven doesn’t reach his full scoring potential just yet.
“He has not shot it as well as I think he can yet,” said Teagle, whose team is 7-3 in the last 10 meetings against the Eagles, including victories in each of the last four seasons. “Once he gets more comfortable and more familiar he’s going to shoot the lights out.
“I’m hoping that it’s not (tonight).”
But VanSkyock knows scoring against the Patriots is no easy task. Jay County is second overall (first in Class 4A) in defensive average, surrendering just 33 points per game.
“It’s going to be a tough testament (to our team) because they’ve never played a team that is that good at defense,” said VanSkyock, who added he hopes to push the ball up the court and try to score early. “If you’re not hitting buckets it’s hard to score against them.”