Indian Lake beats Knights to advance to sectional final
VANDALIA — Through two tournament games here, Indian Lake’s boys basketball team has not looked like a team that was seeded 12th in the sectional.
After beating 10th-seeded Brookville on Friday in the first round, the Lakers dispatched seventh-seeded Greenon 51-45 on Tuesday in a Division III sectional semifinal at Butler High School.
The Lakers (13-12) advance to face a local foe in seventh-seeded West Liberty-Salem at 5:30 p.m. Saturday for a chance to advance to the district championship.
“The (seeding) thing doesn’t really bother us,” said Indian Lake head coach Zach Overturf. “That typically happens to us because a majority of these schools down here are in the same leagues and they stick together. I get that.
“For us, it’s more about trying to make history. I’ve done research and Indian Lake only has seven sectional wins in about 35 or 40 years. Only a couple teams have won more than two tournament games in the same season. That is our motivation.”
Indian Lake already has two tournament wins under its belt in this postseason as a result of its selfless offensive play and its gritty defense.
Zander Barnes and Luke Jackson each scored 16 points and freshmen Camdon Tuttle (nine points) and Caiden Nicol (eight) continued to provide a big impact in their rookie seasons.
The Lakers’ defense was able to contain a Greenon attack that featured three double-digit scorers.
“Our offense has come in waves at times, but the one constant lately has been our defense,” said Overturf. “We are really stepping up our defense and that is allowing us to win basketball games right now.”
Like it did in Friday’s game against Brookville, Indian Lake started slow Tuesday.
The Lakers trailed the Knights by eight (25-17) at halftime.
“I don’t know what it is, but it seems like it just takes us some time to settle in,” said Overturf. “We just told them at halftime to go out and do what we do.”
The Lakers looked more like themselves in the second half as they surged back into the game.
Indian Lake cut Greenon’s lead to four (37-33) at the end of the third quarter and opened the fourth period on a 7-0 run to grab a three-point cushion at 40-37.
The Lakers never relinquished the lead. They used some clutch free-throw shooting in the final minutes to keep the Knights at bay.
“We like to shoot a lot of threes and we also like to play fast,” said Overturf. “I didn’t feel like we were playing very fast in the first half. I told the guys we were playing like deer in the headlights. In the second half, we played at a pace that is more to our liking.”
The Lakers will now look to complete a season sweep of the Tigers, who they defeated 68-57 in the regular season.
“We are going to have to come out and be aggressive from the start,” said Overturf. “It’s nice that we’ve been able to come from behind these last couple of games, but we don’t want to keep putting ourself in that position.”
Jaden Journell led the Knights with 12 points and Mason Potter added 11 points.
INDIAN LAKE 51
GREENON 45
GREENON (11-11)
Ware 3 0-0 7; Hough 3 2-4 9; Journell 6 0-1 12; Minteer 3 0-0 6; Potter 5 1-2 11. Totals: 20 3-7 45.
INDIAN LAKE (13-12)
Nicol 3 0-0 8; Barnes 5 4-6 16; Wurster 1 0-1 2; Tuttle 3 2-2 9; Jackson 4 6-8 16. Totals: 16 12-17 51.
Knights 13 12 12 8 — 45
Lakers 12 5 16 18 — 51
Three pointers: Greenon 2 (Ware, Hough); Indian Lake 7 (Jackson 2, Barnes 2, Nicol 2, Tuttle). Team fouls: Greenon 14; Indian Lake 8.