In the Nick of time

WINCHESTER — In the first 35 minutes, Nick Clemens had taken one shot.
He missed it.
And though he wasn’t the first option as time ticked away in overtime, the senior knew he had to be ready.
So when the ball swung around the top of the key and ended up in his hands with four seconds left, he confidently launched a 3-pointer.
Nick delivered, just two days before Christmas, his shot swishing through the net as time expired to give the Jay County High School boys basketball team a 43-40 overtime victory over the Winchester Golden Falcons.
“That was pretty crazy,” said Clemens, who also had four rebounds. “They just left me open at that time, so I was ready.”
In a game in which points were at a premium, overtime was appropriately scoreless after a couple of player control fouls and a miss by the Patriots’ Jay Houck. Clemens stripped the rebound off the Houck miss away from Golden Falcons junior Kiante Enis, keeping the ball in Jay County’s possession and allowing it to hold for the last shot.
With time winding down, JCHS coach Craig Teagle called a play on which the first look was to find Houck slipping off of a screen to the basket. Clemens, meanwhile, was standing in the right corner.
He began to cut toward the basket and then faded back behind the 3-point line when the defense cut him off.

With the Golden Falcons (5-2) putting their focus on Adam Dirksen and Jay Houck, seniors Zach Pryor and Justin Dirksen passed up on the lead option and used two passes to get the ball to their classmate.
Clemens, who also hit a pair of key free throws late in the Patriots’ season-opening overtime win over Muncie Central, made his only basket of the game with Winchester sophomore Austin Lawrence leaping in his face.
“It’s good to see someone step up like that, especially when we needed it,” said Pryor. “He knew he had to shoot it, so he got it off in time and just hit it.”
“I thought we did a great job of getting it to Nick on the back side,” said Teagle. “And Nick’s a good shooter. … Big shot by a senior. That’s a nice play, something he’ll remember for a long time.”
Clemens’ shot marked the second opportunity for last-second heroics after Enis had a chance to win the game for Winchester at the end of regulation. He took an inbound pass near the top of the key with 6.9 seconds left and went right around a screen, but his driving shot bounced off the left side of the rim and then the right before falling harmlessly to the floor.
“We brought him off a hard ball screen and had our best 3-point shooter in the corner if they helped really hard there,” said Winchester coach Matt Fine, who coached the previous 10 years at Muncie Central. “But Kiante got a great look at it and sometimes that just happens. He finishes that 99 out of 100 times at the rim.”
Most of the game played out as a battle of each team’s strength offensively, with Winchester putting the ball in the hands of Enis and Jay County trying to work it inside to Adam Dirksen.
Enis, who came off the bench, scored 58 percent of his team’s points as he finished with a game-high 23 to go along with seven rebounds. He was 12-of-14 at the free-throw line, with 10 of those foul shots coming in the fourth quarter.
Dirksen was perfect at the line — 7-of-7 — and shot efficiently from the field, making six of his eight attempts to finish with 17 points. Houck added nine points for the Patriots.
Pryor totaled eight points and had team highs of five rebounds and three assists.
“He got to the rim early for us, which was big because that takes some of the pressure off our big guys,” said Teagle.
Neither team led by more than four, with Jay County holding a 20-16 advantage in the second quarter before the Golden Falcons pulled even at the intermission. Winchester scored the first points of the second half and never trailed again until Clemens in the game-winning basket.

Junior varsity
Jay County bounced back from a rough second quarter to dominate the third as it picked up a 38-32 victory over the Golden Falcons.
The Patriots (4-4) led by six after the opening quarter, but managed only three points in the second to fall behind by one. They outscored Winchester 12-5 in the third quarter en route to the win.
Ryan Burkett powered JCHS with 12 points, 10 of which came in the first half. He hit a pair of 3-pointers.
Spencer Calvert added nine points, and Justin Crouch scored eight.
Lukas Mills totaled 13 points, including a trio of 3-pointers, for the Golden Falcons. Mason Melton chipped in six points.