Patriots looking for successful rematch (03/11/04)

PORTLAND — Saturday could become the “rematch regional” for the Jay County Patriot boys basketball team.

Jay County will play the No. 7 Bellmont Braves in a rematch of the Jan. 20 regular-season game in the semifinal round of the NorthWood regional Saturday at noon.

“I think we’ve improved a lot since we played them, but they’ve improved a lot too,” said Jay County coach Craig Teagle. “Everyone just has to move their game up another notch. We’re at the next level so we have to play at the next level.”

If the Patriots get a semifinal win the Fort Wayne Elmhurst Trojans could be awaiting them for a rematch of last season’s regional title game.

Elmhurst (15-7) will play Northridge (15-8) in the other semifinal game at 10 a.m. The winners will meet for the championship at 8 p.m.

“I want to win it,” said senior Dustin Overton. “It makes it even better playing Bellmont because I want to beat them even worse. (We have to have) better shot selection.

“(A regional championship rematch would) be awesome. That’s all I’ve been thinking about actually. It’d be fun to play Elmhurst again — to go back and play against (Indiana University recruit James) Hardy and hopefully win this time.”

Bellmont defeated Jay County 62-51 this season. The Braves converted five first-quarter Patriot turnovers into a 13-0 run in that game.

Jay County pulled to within five points early in the second half, but later allowed a 15-3 run to fall behind by 20 points. It made a furious fourth-quarter rally, but didn’t have enough to complete the comeback.

Although his Braves came through the most difficult sectional in Class 3A, Bellmont coach Shaun Busick said there is no chance his team will be overlooking Jay County.

“We’re not going to overlook anybody,” said Busick, whose team defeated Fort Wayne Bishop Luers, No. 1 Fort Wayne Concordia and No. 10 Leo in the sectional tournament. “Our memory is long, and if you remember last year we got spanked twice by the Patriots.”

The Patriots topped Bellmont 67-50 in the regular-season last year and beat the Braves again in the opening round of the sectional tournament 75-53 at Blackford. This year’s sectional realignment has allowed the teams to meet a week later.

“We know that they’re capable of doing the same thing, especially the way Trent Bailey and the rest of the team are playing right now,” Busick added. “First and foremost we have to limit their good looks at the basket. All Bailey needs is about one 50th of a second to get a shot off. It’s amazing watching the game tape against Mississinewa and some of the shots he made in the second quarter.”

Bailey tossed in 33 points in Jay County’s 73-67 sectional championship victory over Mississinewa, including 21 in the second quarter. Busick is familiar with that type of outburst, as Bailey racked up 18 points in the fourth quarter against Bellmont in the first meeting between the two teams this year.

For that reason Jay County will have to get other scorers involved early in the game. The Braves will be sure to hound Bailey from the opening tip.

“They’ll have somebody probably denying me,” said Bailey. “Once they start chasing me coming off screens then somebody else is going to have to be open and we have to get that person the ball.

“We’re just going to have to come out and have our post players play well because the other team is so big. If everybody can just come out and play their game we’ll have a really good chance of winning it all.”

“I think we’ve got to establish Dustin and Mark right away,” added Teagle. “I think we’ve got to get post scores or at least inside looks. You can’t live by the three. Usually if you shoot it well in one half you don’t shoot it well in the other.”

That will mean senior Dustin Overton — who had 23 points in the sectional opening win over Elwood and is averaging 12.1 ppg — and the other Patriots will have to find ways to put the ball in the basket early and often.

Teagle said he looks for 6-foot-6 junior forward Mark Kelly (7.0 ppg) and freshman Corey Comer (5.7 ppg) to get some inside scoring, and would like to see junior Andy Pinkerton (4.6 ppg) and senior point guard Heath Williams (4.5 ppg) hit some outside shots to help spread the defense.

Williams could be the biggest difference from the first meeting when he had not quite completely healed from an ankle injury which kept him out of the first three games of the season. Busick also said he thinks Jay County’s post play has improved since mid-January.

Bellmont will counter with a couple of juniors who are likely to be playing Division I college basketball two years from now.

Adam Arnold, who had 21 points and 14 rebounds in the first meeting, leads the Braves with 16.8 points and 11.5 rebounds per game. Aaron Richie put in 20 points in the first contest and is second on the squad with 12.7 points, 5.3 rebounds and 3.2 assist per game.

Arnold is a huge force in the middle of the defense with 75 blocks on the year while Richie has hit a team-high 35 3-pointers.

Bellmont, which was rated No. 1 earlier this season, got through the sectional partially because a few other players showed some scoring prowess. Richie, Bryan Schultz (9.5 ppg) and Jon Zeser (7.2 ppg) took turns leading the team in scoring during the tournament.

Still, Jay County will focus primarily on Arnold and Richie.

“You’ve got to do something to control Arnold,” said Teagle. “You have to keep him with limited touches, because when he does get it you’re in trouble.

“Richie, we can’t let him get to the basket. We can’t let him have open looks. I thought he hurt us shooting the three, but I thought he really hurt us driving to the basket.”

“We’ve got to play hard, smart and together,” said Williams, noting defense as the key to victory. “We’ve got to try to not let the ball go in to Arnold. We’ve got to stop Richie and Arnold and make sure somebody else doesn’t have a huge game.”

Teagle also pointed to rebounding as a big factor, as the Patriots allowed 14 offensive boards in the first contest.

But, the most important factor might be what happened last year. Jay County topped New Prairie in the regional semifinal round last year, and lost by a slim 62-59 margin to Elmhurst in the championship game.

“I think just the experience of going there last year was important,” said Teagle. “During sectional week that’s what a lot of kids talked about. I think the logical goal for us is to reach that next level, and the next level is to reach win a regional championship.”

“Our goal is definitely to win it all,” said Bailey. “We have a lot more confidence than last year having some experience in there. We know how great it would be to win it because we were so close last year. We’d like to come through and win it all this year.”[[In-content Ad]]