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2006 IHSAA Boys Basketball TourneyClass 2A North Judson Regional PreviewA USA-365.com Special Report by Mark Smith(3-10-2006) |
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2006 IHSAA Boys Basketball TourneyClass 2A North Judson Regional PreviewA USA-365.com Special Report by Mark Smith(3-10-2006) |
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Class
2A - North Judson Regional
Game 1 – Westview (12-9) vs. BOONE GROVE (18-5) -- 10:00 a.m., CST
Game 2 – Rochester (17-5) vs. North Montgomery (19-3) -- 12:00 p.m., CST
Championship –- 8:00 p.m., CST
NORTH JUDSON (3-11-2006) I know that Boone Grove has never won a regional title. But you have to like their chances at the Class 2A North Judson Regional this Saturday, at least in the first game.
The Wolves play Westview (12-9), an upset winner over favored Jimtown at the Jimtown sectional. Westview did not get to play the game until Monday (3-6-2006) night because Westview's girls were playing in the state finals Saturday, postponing the sectional title game. Boone has seen Westview. Westview, with one (maybe two) less practices, has never seen Boone Grove.
Westview stopped defending regional champ John Glenn 48-46 in an overtime semifinal, rallying from a nine-point deficit in the second half. The Warriors are young and small, with no player taller than 6-foot-3 center Taylor Aspy. Freshman Adam Christner, a 5-foot-7 guard, scored 13 in the win over Glenn. It sounds like Westview has an elite class that is only at the sophomore level. They have six sophomores on the varsity and many of them play.
Virtually everyone who plays for Westview is a true guard. So, they will spread the floor and wait for you to make a mistake defensively. That could be very effective against a Boone team that is admittedly fairly slow. I've never heard a complete explanation of this, but Westview always has a boy or two named Yoder. I'm serious. This year, 5-10 sophomore Justin Yoder and 6-0 senior Chase Yoder play for coach Rob Yoder. So what? The 2004 team had Jared Yoder, Ryan Yoder and Brock Yoder. One season there were five Yoders. It apparently is a very common name in rural LaGrange county which is straight east of Elkhart about 25 miles south of the Michigan state line.
This team will be formidable in the years to come, but Boone has three players in John Shurr, Will Mitchell and Bryce Palleson who can match up with Westview's small lineup and Boone can win the rebounding battle close to the basket. The Warriors will steal the ball some on the press, but not enough to win here. Boone Grove is well suited to win this game by 10 points.
Rochester has a lot of offense, averaging 66 points a game and they want to outrun a tall North Montgomery team in the other Judson 2A semifinal. 6-4 Luke Smith is a lead guard who rolled up 12 assists in Rochester's 71-64 sectional semifinal win over Rensselaer. He is a top-100 player state wide who is a major matchup problem. The Zebras have 6-foot-8 Josh Stoops at center with 6-3 junior Cory Overmeyer getting rebounds and scoring inside. Overmeyer had 18 points and 10 rebounds against Rensselaer.
North Montgomery also has big boys like 6-foot-7 Kevin Kyle, who scored 27 in NM's 66-62 win over Clinton Central in the Fountain Central 2A Sectional title game. 6-3 soph forward AJ Sutherlin scored 13 against Clinton Central, a game where NM sank 18 of 26 from the line.
These teams do not meet and have no common opponents. But a guess would be that Rochester has played a better schedule, losing to 4A Warsaw 70-63 in overtime and defeating 4A Logansport 62-46. Rochester is 14-1 against 1A and 2A schools but North Montgomery, a defending sectional champ, is 11-0. But Rochester has played road games at Plymouth, Tippecanoe Valley and North Judson. Other than a 15-point loss at McCutcheon, the Chargers have not been on the road much against good teams.
Smith is the best player at this regional and I don't know of North Montgomery's defensive match for him where as Rochester has a match for Kyle, who averages 17 points a game. Basketball in the rural area south of Lafayette is notoriously lame. I like Rochester to win by 13 points.
That puts Boone Grove and Rochester in the finals and the fact that Boone plays first Saturday may be an edge. Rochester has to press Boone to win. They can and will because they don't want a half court game, but they will tire playing twice in the same day.
There's a lot on the line here, but the history is widely different. The city of Rochester, which is about 50 miles due south of downtown South Bend, was a northern Indiana prep basketball superpower of another era. Rochester and Richland Center, the school that consolidated with Rochester in 1953, have won 32 sectionals but only six since 1950. The change factor was probably that larger schools (like Warsaw) grew up around Rochester and they could no longer win in the old one class tournament.
But the Zebras (they most certainly do have a zebra mascot) have tradition and they will have a very large following Saturday at North
Judson, which is only about 20 minutes to the west. Boone historically was always in the 'Bermuda triangle' where small Indiana schools went to die in the state tournament. They are too close (3 miles) to superpower big school Valparaiso, which has won 48 sectionals.
Boone history is full of sectional losses to Valparaiso, Portage and Chesterton -- all schools three and four times Boone's size.
So Boone never won a sectional before they moved to the KV Sectional in the early 1980s and the Wolves have never advanced beyond the regional level. This would be a landmark achievement for them and the greatest moment in the history of the boys basketball program.
The key player in a Rochester-Boone game would be 6-3 senior Will Mitchell, who would be assigned to Rochester star Luke Smith (21.5 ppg.). If Boone can hold Smith under 20 points and make others take shots, they should stay in this game. Boone will get a 50-50 share of rebounds with 6-4 Jon Shurr and 6-1, 210-pound David Mastey. Another key match will be top-scoring sophomore Kory Barnett against Boone's Bryce Palleson (15 ppg.).
Palleson (15.3 points) has to get the best of that match while Joe Johnson and Jake Pivarnik must stay calm against the Rochester press. Its almost better to get a 10-second violation than to throw the ball away. Boone Grove vs. Rochester is an excellent matchup and these two teams should consider an annual date. On Saturday, Boone has the defense to handle this situation. When boys play a second game in one day the game slows down and that's what Boone wants. The Wolves also have the depth to play twice and
versatile players to handle anything except great back court speed, which Rochester does not have.
The size of the Zebras will get some easy baskets inside and Smith will score 15-20. But Boone Grove has played Valpo and Chesterton. Rochester has not taken on any big schools of that caliber. The Wolves can get and make shots in the half-court offense here. They have the screeners, the dribble-drivers and the shooters if they keep the pace slow. It's an achievement, but historically no big deal to win Boone's sectional. Sectional rival Hanover hasn't won it in 20 years. Lake Station hasn't won in 60 years and Wheeler's never won. Winning the regional would be a very big deal. Saturday night, the deal gets done.
Boone Grove finally wins the school's first regional championship
BOONE GROVE 51, No. 10 Rochester 44