Batesville Herald Tribune

 

Gary Dudgeon

For The Herald-Tribune

SEYMOUR — After a lackluster first half, Jac-Cen-Del coach David Bradshaw had a few remarks for his charges at halftime. Going into the locker room, the Eagles trailed 17-11 after shooting 2-of-11 in the second quarter.

“What we went over was what we had to do to win this game in the second half,” Bradshaw said.

His players recall it a little differently.

“We got a good yelling at in the locker room,” remembered Matt Gehl. “The seniors got together and decided we had to play the kind of basketball we could. We didn’t force it as much as we did in the first half. We just played a lot smarter. In the second half everybody really wanted it.”

The result was a 12-point turnaround as JCD defeated North Daviess 38-32 to advance to next week’s Class A championship game against Triton at Conseco Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.

A major weakness that the Eagles displayed in the first two quarters was that far too many passes ended up in the hands of players wearing a different color jersey. All told, the Cougars picked off seven soft passes in the first half. Only twice did they convert points on the offensive end, but the Eagles were still denied the opportunity themselves. Those miscues probably drew the brunt of Bradshaw’s ire.

“One of the biggest things was that we had too many soft passes in the first half,” he said. “If it weren’t for those passes, we could have won by a wider margin.”

Even in the first half, JCD was able to convert nearly half its possessions when the Eagles were able to take a shot. Because of poor passing, the Eagles trailed after 16 minutes.

The third quarter started with an Eagle stop and a triple by Blake Sutton. Kendall Wittmer followed with a runner for North Daviess, but Trevor and Tim Arnett hit a trey and a second-chance basket, respectively, to forge the first tie since it was 7-7.

Gehl found Tom Arnett on the next possession for a basket inside to give the Eagles the lead at 21-19.

After a torrid start, JCD cooled off to enable the Cougars to reclaim the lead 25-23 as the clock ticked down on the third quarter.

It was then that Tim Arnett found Gehl free beyond the arc and the Eagles’ senior put JCD ahead.

North Daviess chose to work for the final shot of the quarter, but Sutton foiled the plan. Logan Wagler returned the favor, but his desperation shot was well off the mark.

 

Arnett got the final period going with a free throw, but Jacob Miller scored inside for the Cougars to knot the score one last time at 27-27.

Arnett again found a shooter open on the periphery with Sutton knocking down his second triple to give the Eagles a 30-27 lead.

“I don’t think they expected us to spread it out as early as we did in the game,” Bradshaw said.

With the lead, JCD was able to pass the ball around the periphery, eating precious time off the clock. The strategy worked well except two execution errors gave the Cougars another chance with Thomas Nugent scoring following a charging call to close the count to 30-29.

Still the ball stayed on the periphery.

Gehl was fouled with 2:31 to go and made both shots to stretch the lead to three points and the Eagles got a stop. Back on offense, JCD continued to milk the clock until Trevor Arnett was fouled at the 1:03 mark. He converted the 1-and-1 and the Eagles held a five-point lead 34-29.

Another stop and a Trevor Arnett basket stretched the lead to 36-29 before Wagler hit a triple for the Cougars’ final score.

JCD got free throws from Gehl and Tim Arnett, but North Daviess was unable to capitalize on the misses as JCD advanced with a 38-32 final tally.