H.S. Basketball: Hanover Central Boys lose 66-47 to top-rated Wheeler

Team	1st Qtr	2nd Qtr	3rd Qtr	4th Qtr	Final
HANOVER CENTRAL (3-3)	11	14	7	15	47
WHEELER (9-0)	15	19	20	12	66

WHEELER (66) Joe Dobson 9-3-25, Steve Wilson 1-1-3, Cordale Micou 7-0-14, Andrew Patten 3-2-8, Steve Stambaugh 2-0-6, Nick Pitts 2-0-5, Wes Barnes 0-0-0, Sean Mills 1-0-2, Zach Green 0-0-0. TOTALS: 0-0-0.
FTS: 6-9, 66.6% - Dobson 3-6, Patten 2-2, Wilson 1-1.
REBOUNDS: Andrew Patten - 11
ASSISTS: Steve Wilson - 7, Andrew Patten - 6.
STEALS: Cordale Micou - 3
FOULED OUT: none
3-POINT GOALS (9) Joe Dobson 5, Steve Stambaugh 2, Cordale Micou 2.

HANOVER CENTRAL (47) Jeff Johnson 6-0-18, Brandon Hegg 2-2-6, Adam Suarez 0-0-0, Greg Shroka 1-0-2, Dave Ploetz 1-0-2, Owen Goff 8-0-17, Jeremy Peterson 0-0-0, Matt Jackson 0-0-0, Doug Billinski 0-0-0, Billy Nordyke 1-0-2. TOTALS: 19-2-47.
FTS: 2-3, 66.7%..........Hegg 2-2, Ploetz 0-1
ASSISTS: Jeff Johnson - 3
REBOUNDS: Jeff Johnson - 6
STEALS: Jeff Johnson - 3
FOULED OUT: none
3-POINT GOALS (7) Jeff Johnson 6, Owen Goff.

Team	1st Qtr	2nd Qtr	3rd Qtr	4th Qtr	Final
HANOVER CENTRAL (3-4)	11	18	7	9	45
HOBART (4-5)	10	15	4	25	54

Wheeler Holiday Tournament - 3rd place - Saturday, 12-27-2003 in Union Township

HOBART (54) Matt Glover 2-2-7, Andrew Martin 1-0-2, Tim Johnson 1-8-11, Andrew Zimmer 3-13-19, Matt Polinski 3-0-6, Josh Fuller 2-0-5, Brandon Smith 1-2-4, Richard Mitchell 0-0-0. TOTALS: 13-25-54.

FTS: 23-37, 62.1 percent - Glover 2-6, Johnson 8-8, Zimmer 13-15, Polinski 0-1, Smith 2-2.
FOULED OUT: none
3-POINT GOALS (3) Matt Glover, Tim Johnson, Josh Fuller.

HANOVER CENTRAL (45) Jeff Johnson 5-0-12, Brandon Hegg 2-0-4, Adam Suarez 0-0-0, Greg Shroka 1-2-4, Dave Ploetz 2-0-4, Owen Goff 7-4-19, Jeremy Peterson 0-2-2, Matt Jackson 0-0-0, Doug Billinski 0-0-0, Billy Nordyke 0-0-0. TOTALS: 17-8-45.

FTS: 8-15, 53.3 percent, Peterson 2-4, Goff 4-6, Shroka 2-5.
FOULED OUT: none
3-POINT GOALS (3) Jeff Johnson 2, Goff.

VALPARAISO (12-27-2003) - It's odd that people from Wheeler spoke of basketball's version of respect after they started the season 8-0 and were not rated highly by some. Hanover Central has been looking for any recognition at all the entire four decades of its existence.

The Wildcats lost the Wheeler Holiday Tournament semifinals to undefeated Wheeler (10-0) late Friday in front of about 750 fans in the tiny green and orange Bearcat gym. Hanover (3-4) then lost to Hobart 54-45 in the consolation game to fall under the .500 mark for the season.

In the cases of both Hanover and Wheeler, the stature they seek cannot be obtained in December. You only get it at the sectional. As of last Friday, it was clear that Wheeler is a lot closer to that goal then HC is. The question is, how close?

"There's a lot of people in the region that don't believe in these kids," said veteran coach Randy Stelter of his Bearcat boys, who have defeated big school powers Andrean and Munster. "We feel that defensively our kids can play with anyone because they're quick. We aren't very big but we can take teams out of what they want to do."

"I don't think they're number one," said Hanover junior Doug Billinski of the new sheriff in this basketball 'town'. "They're good but they're not that good. We can play with them. We just didn't do anything in the third quarter."

Twenty-four hours later, nobody was happy at either school. Hanover had given up a six-point lead and lost 54-45 to Hobart while Wheeler had lost a 10-point first half lead and a seven point second half edge in a 63-61 upset loss to sub.-.500 Hammond high.

The defeats probably will be good for both teams. Wheeler needed a loss to take the target off their backs. Hammond played Wheeler like they were the Los Angeles Lakers. No team ever benefits from being undefeated. Hanover didn't need a feel-good win over Hobart and if they're angry about losing to a 4A school, that's even better. If Hanover is going to win the Porter County Conference (PCC) tournament in three weeks, a realistic goal, they occasionally exhibited and consistently witnessed the kind of intensity it will take to play with Boone Grove and Morgan Township, the PCC favorites.

"We were playing with them," said HC coach Dave Uran of sectional rival Wheeler, "Until the end of the first half and then we did nothing at the start of the third quarter."

Hanover, which got beat by 31 points in the Porter County Conference (PCC) championship game last year as Wheeler took the title in their final year in the league, had cut an early Bearcat lead to 24-21 and then 31-25 in the final minute of the second quarter. But HC couldn't get a loose ball in one of the very physical scrambles and Joe Dobson scored a three point play to give Wheeler a nine-point halftime lead.

At the start of the second half, Hanover missed seven shots, including a couple of easy ones, in the first three minutes. The Bearcats, who were 21-3 last year, ripped off an 8-2 run and later a 9-0 run that made it 54-32 after three quarters.

"We're as quick as they are," argued Uran. "We could have been up ten in the first half if we could just rebound. That was the difference in the game. We are not fundamentally sound in blocking out. We keep trying to teach rebounding without watching the ball. We're watching the flight of the ball instead of blocking out. When a shot goes up, we've got to find a guy and block him out. We keep talking about it but they've got to execute it."

"We've got to clean that up as a program. We're watching the ball flight while guys are slipping around us. Then we do get position and we're jumping straight up instead of driving them (the other team's rebounder) back. It was our weak side rebounding and our lower two guys (in the zone) watching too much ball flight."

The strength of Wheeler is their physical play and ability to pass. The Bearcats didn't display high percentage shooting, except for Joe Dobson, who popped the HC 2-1-2 zone with corner three-point shots. But football star Andrew Patten, only 6-foot tall at best, grabbed 11 rebounds and 6-3 football quarterback Steve Wilson dished out seven assists. Wheeler's quick passing found holes in the Hanover defense.

"We came out of the gate pretty good. If we could just have done a good job on the boards, we'd have had a good lead and worried them. We cut 12 points (the margin of victory) off last year."

"If we score, make three or four of those shots at the start of the second half, then we've got the number one team in the area getting nervous about us. We had good shots. I'm talking about shots in the paint."

"With five seniors, it seems that every night somebody is stepping up to be big for us. That's crucial. Joe Dobson has done it a couple of times."

Dobson drifted to the corner against Hanover's match-up zone defense and hit five three-point shots to blow the game open. The problem was defending long-armed 6-2 point guard Cordale Micou (18 ppg.) and getting the ball away from all-purpose 5-10 football star Andrew Patten, who scored eight points and grabbed 11 rebounds."

"You have to give up something," said Uran, who really doesn't have a center and had trouble matching up on the perimeter with the BearCats.

The consolation game was a match HC should have won. In what was probably the first-ever meeting of 2A Hanover and 4A Hobart, the Brickies simply hustled and scrapped their way to the lead largely due to 25 of 32 from the foul line.
Owen Goff scored a career-best 19 points and gave HC somewhat of a post presence on offense. But the Brickies played especially hard, if not well, and Hanover went home 0-2 in the Cats first ever holiday tournament.

CAT NOTES: What Hanover Central and Lowell will notice this week is how both teams come out of the holiday break. HC coach Dave Uran wanted two high-intensity games over the holidays while Lowell's Mike Magley has always pointed to the length of the season and welcomed the two-week Christmas break, one that the Red Devils annually sit out. Lowell (5-1) hosts Hanover Saturday night.

With Hanover planning a new 2,500-seat gymnasium and Lowell renovating theirs, the opportunity is there for HC to team with Lowell and invite local but non-PCC or LAC teams (you don't want conference foes in non conference games) like North Newton, North Judson and maybe even Crown Point or East Chicago in a local holiday tournament. Hanover does not play Crown Point in boys basketball would like to. Lowell has EC as a sectional foe and would like to schedule them during the regular season. It would be a natural.

Hanover girls players Katie Burke and Katie Westerhoff, who played in HC's Momence (Ill.) quarterfinal loss to Gibson City at noon Friday (Dec. 26) showed up to support the Hanover boys in Friday night's 8 p.m. game at Wheeler. Both were back in Momence and helping the Lady Cats win at 8:30 a.m. Saturday morning.

Athletic director Dave Seils also was in attendance at Momence and at Wheeler both Friday and Saturday.

Wheeler coach and athletic director Randy Stelter is happy with Wheeler's move from the Porter County Conference (PCC) to the Lake Athletic Conference (LAC) even though not everyone at Wheeler is. That's why Wheeler has been so loud and proud about the school's basketball success (boys 1st, girls 2nd) in the school's first LAC championship tournament.

The drawback from leaving the PCC in basketball is financial. PCC schools bring more fans to basketball games than LAC Blue division teams.

"We've tried to keep the PCC teams on the schedule," said Stelter. We've still got Morgan Township and Hanover's here in the tournament. We'd like to get Hebron but they are 1A and we need to play bigger schools."

Wheeler is getting a huge media bump from the move. The Bearcats foes, who used to be country schools Kouts and Hebron are now Hammond city schools Clark and Gavit. Hammond, obviously, is the home of WJOB (1230) AM and the original home and subscription base of the Times newspaper. Wheeler almost never played in Lake County in past years. Now they make several trips and host Lake County teams. Coverage of Wheeler games formerly was limited to the Porter County edition of the Times and Post-Tribune. Now, Wheeler games are in both the Lake and Porter editions. Many in Hammond, where most northwest media is based, didn't know where Wheeler was. Now, they go there and read about games every week.

"That's the point I was trying to make to the school board and the community when we first proposed this move," said Stelter. "There's nothing wrong with the PCC. But the LAC has sports that the PCC doesn't. We needed to make the move for our future."

Coach Stelter might want to delegate some authority, though. He could also be seen sweeping the playing floor between games.

"Absolutely it works for us," he said. "We want to play better competition. And there's nothing better than the team that's number one, according to the newspapers."

With the girls home for the holidays at 9-3 and the boys starting holiday play at 8-0, Wheeler egos were at an all time high but it was good natured. It took a mean, old reporter to remind many in green and orange (Wheeler colors) that Boone Grove is the defending boys and girls Class 2A basketball champion of northwest Indiana and both defeated Wheeler.

"We know we can't get the respect for our program," agreed Stelter, "until we win the sectional.".

Wheeler Tournament
Dec. 26: L, 47-66 Wheeler (9-1)
Dec. 27: L, 45-54 Hobart (3-4)
Jan. 3 (S) at Lowell (5-1)
Jan. 6 (Tu) Whiting (0-6)
Jan. 9 (F) at BOONE GROVE (3-2)
Jan. 13 (Tu) Beecher (Ill.)
Jan. 15 (Th) at Gavit (1-6)

Hanover Central Boys lose to area's top-rated Wheeler in Holiday Tournament, 66-47

A USA-365.com Special Report By Mark Smith