MSHSAA District Boy's Basketball Tournament Articles
Class 3, District #8
District Tournament Round 1
California/North Callaway| Boonville/Centralia | Blair Oaks/South Callaway| Hallsville/Southern Boone
District Tournament Round 2
California/Centralia| Blair Oaks/Southern Boone
District Tournament Championship
California/Blair Oaks
The game was slated for a prompt 6 p.m. tipoff. But it looked as though only Justin Mills and Centralia showed up before 6:15. Mills scored the game’s first nine points as the Panthers jumped to an 11-0 lead last night in a 74-61 win over Boonville in the Class 3 District 8 Tournament. Fifth-seeded Centralia (15-11) advanced to face top-seeded California (17-9) tomorrow’s semifinal. California beat North Callaway 64-54 earlier yesterday. Mills’ fast start provided Centralia with a comfortable working margin for most of the game. In fact, the Panthers never trailed. "Justin’s what I call a tempo-setter," Centralia Coach Brian Brown said. "Usually, he’s doing it on the defensive end." Mills, a 5-foot-11 senior, made all four of his attempts in his personal 9-0 run. He scored just two more points after that. Conversely, the fourth-seeded Pirates shot 1 for 10 in the first quarter and found themselves trailing 15-6. Boonville (11-13) started making shots in the second quarter, which allowed the Pirates to press. This was a mixed blessing. Although the Pirates did convert several steals into points, Centralia often beat the press for layups. "I thought the front side of our press was effective," Boonville Coach Chris Shikles said. "But we needed to cover the whole length of the floor." The beneficiary of the Panthers’ press break was 6-3 senior forward Brian Buckert, who had 12 points in the second quarter. Nearly all 12 of them were on layups or free throws after Buckert got behind the press and was fouled.
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"We just outran them," Buckert said. "They had some fast guys, but we made good passes. We got passes where they couldn’t trap." Buckert finished with 21 points and seven rebounds. Dyson Dick had 10 points and six rebounds. Boonville stayed competitive thanks to 5-9 senior guard Martez Callaway, who had a game-high 23 points and seven steals in his last game as a Pirate. "He carried the load like he did for us all year," Shikles said. "Centralia did a good job of keying on him, doubling him. He was working hard to get shots. The whole night was a grind for us on offense." Looking ahead, Brown said the Panthers will have matchup problems against California. "They’re a very disciplined ballclub, and they’re big," he said. The Pintos have eight players listed at 6-2 or taller and were led last night by 6-3 forwards Adam Chesser and Justin Byrd, who scored 18 and 12 points, respectively. This means Centralia will need steady production from Buckert, who had seven rebounds to go with his 21 points, and 6-3 forward Dyson Dick, who had 10 points and six rebounds last night. |
Tyler Thompson’s teammates on the Southern Boone boys basketball team can count on him to knock down a couple 3-pointers each game. Southern Boone Coach Andy Jahnsen can rely on Tyler Knierim to play sound defense against the opposing team’s best player. Last night in the Class 3 District 8 Tournament, they proved they’re capable of doing much more when needed. Thompson made four 3-pointers and finished with a team-high 18 points. Knierim added 13 points, eight above his average, to help Southern Boone beat Hallsville 57-51. The Eagles play Blair Oaks, which defeated South Callaway 60-43, in a semifinal at 7:30 p.m. tomorrow. "Tyler Knierim had a huge game defensively and offensively," Jahnsen said. "He’s one of those kids that does everything I ask him to do. He’s just a gutsy kid." Thompson’s fourth 3-pointer gave Southern Boone its biggest lead of the game, 52-37, with 3:07 to play, but Hallsville didn’t quit. The third-seeded Indians applied full-court pressure, forced turnovers and knocked down their shots. Over the next 2:10, Hallsville went on a 14-2 run. Blake Berkbuegler scored five points during the stretch and helped cap the run. Berkbuegler, who scored a game-high 22 points, missed a shot with about 1 minute to play and fell to the court. But the rebound dropped to him, and he passed to Derek Kitch while still lying on the court. Kitch scored to pull Hallsville within 54-51. "Those kids just fought their butts off to get that game back within three points," Hallsville Coach Matt Heet said. "Couple things go right and who knows how that game turns out?" The run came to a halt when Brandon Baker picked up his fourth foul and Thompson made both ends of the 1-and-1 with 24.8 seconds left.
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On Hallsville’s next possession, Ryan Crane missed his attempt from behind the arc and Knierim pulled down the rebound. Kyle Miller made 1 of 2 free throws with 7.3 seconds to play to secure the win for the sixth-seeded Eagles. "Our goal is to win a district title, and this puts us one step closer," Jahnsen said. It’s a win that can be traced to the work the Eagles (11-14) put in Monday. At practice, Southern Boone worked on a new defense in which it doubled down in the post. "That seemed to work pretty well," Thompson said. "It got the ball out of the bottom guy’s hands." Southern Boone held Hallsville’s post players to nine points - Kitch scored eight, Baker added one and Tyler Rollins was held scoreless. The Eagles’ speed and pressure on defense had an impact on the Hallsville team. The Indians (14-11) were limited to 11 points in each of the first three quarters. "I preached defense all night long," Jahnsen said. "I told the kids if they were willing to commit to that end of the court the offense would come." Thompson stayed after practice to work on his shot Monday because he struggled from behind the arc in the Eagles’ past couple games. "Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. Yeah," Thompson said when asked if that made a difference. Assistant coach Tim Gilmore "has been talking to me. I’ve been fading away a little bit."
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| http://www.columbiatribune.com/2008/Feb/20080227Spor004.asp | |
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During the course of last night’s postgame interview, Blair Oaks players Brandon Moore and Andrew Pointer used the word "composure" seven times in a span of 6 minutes, 5 seconds. The Falcons demonstrated their ability to remain composed almost that many times during its Class 3 District 8 Tournament semifinal game against Southern Boone. In a game filled with runs, Blair Oaks always had an answer and won 61-46. With 5:43 to play in the third quarter, the Eagles pulled within 30-28 on a Jacob White basket. It was the closest Southern Boone had been since the score was 2-0 and the game was 25 seconds old. Pointer responded by recording five straight points. He scored with 5:26 to play and added another basket in transition at 5:01. He was fouled after a series of misses and offensive rebounds around the basket and made 1 of 2 free throws with 3:41 left. He finished with a game-high 23 points. "Drew was huge," Blair Oaks Coach Ryan Fick said. "That’s senior leadership right there. That’s somebody who’s been in these types of games before, and he stepped up tonight. You couldn’t ask for more from him." Ricky Old put together a run of his own for the sixth-seeded Eagles. It began when Tyler Thompson stripped a Blair Oaks ball-handler and then tossed the ball cross court to Old. With 1:28 to play in the third quarter, he hit a 3-pointer in front of the Southern Boone student section to make the score 37-33. Old then recorded a steal on the Falcons’ next possession and dribbled in for a layup. The final two points came from the free-throw line with 33.3 seconds left and tied the score at 37. The Eagles (11-15) were fired up and so were their fans, but the excitement didn’t last. Forty-six seconds into the fourth quarter, Moore scored and was fouled by White, but he missed the chance to make it a three-point play. That was a sign of things to come. Moore went to the line four more times in the fourth quarter and made 5 of 9 free throws in the game’s final eight minutes. He finished second on the team with 17 points.
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"Brandon Moore did a good job in the fourth quarter getting in the middle of the lane, breaking their defense down and finding the open guy and guys knocked shots down," Fick said. In the fourth quarter, Blair Oaks (16-10) outscored Southern Boone 24-9 to run away with the game. According to Moore and Pointer, the second-seeded Falcons’ solid play in the game’s final quarter is rooted in close losses earlier in the season to St. James, Fulton and California. "We got into practice and we were just tired of losing," Pointer said. "We couldn’t finish out games, so that’s what our goal was." To remedy the problem, Blair Oaks simulated end-of-game situations in practice by putting 30 seconds to 1 minute on the clock and running plays. "We work on these situations all the time," Moore said. "We come out. We don’t lose our composure. We’re starting to play as a team. We just do what we do in practice." The Falcons will have a chance to see how far they’ve come when they play California in the final. The schools have played three times this season, with the Pintos winning the two most recent games. |
California 64, Centralia 58: "I thought they did a good job controlling the tempo with their offense," Centralia Coach Brian Brown said. "Even when we were able to turn it up a little bit and get a couple steals, we never really got on a run, especially in the second half, that we could sustain." Adam Chesser scored 27 points and Dustin Cook added 19 for the top-seeded Pintos (20-9). Aaron Kroeger led Centralia (15-12) with 11 points. Jardyn Angell and Dyson Dick each added 10. |
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To fully appreciate just how dominant the Blair Oaks boys basketball team was on the defensive end in the Class 3 District 8 championship against California, consider the following statistics: ● In the second quarter, the Pintos were 2 of 13 from the field, and it went downhill after that. California was 1 of 15 from the field in the second half and finished the game 9 of 45 from the field. ● The Falcons could have scored eight points in the second half and still won the game. ● California forward Adam Chesser scored 29 points and attempted 18 free throws when Blair Oaks played the Pintos on Feb. 18. Last night, the Falcons held him to six points and he attempted two free throws. Blair Oaks outscored California 26-4 in the second half and advanced to the state sectionals with a 43-24 win. It’s the second consecutive district title for the Falcons, who will play the District 8 winner at 7:45 p.m. Wednesday at Moberly Area Community College. "All I got to say is defense was there tonight," Blair Oaks forward Andrew Pointer said. "We played the best defense we’ve played all year tonight. Pointer fronted Chesser in the post, and whenever the California junior touched the ball, he got help from his teammates. "We didn’t really change our game plan much" against Chesser, Blair Oaks Coach Ryan Fick said. "I think we executed it better tonight. That was a lot of the things we wanted to do the last time we played them. But I thought tonight he had to work a lot harder to get touches than he did the last time we played. Every time somebody went to the basket, there weren’t very many uncontested shots." Blair Oaks (17-10) got points from five players as it jumped out to a quick 10-4 lead. After Justin Eiken stole the ball and Brandon Otto scored a put-back basket when Eiken’s fast-break layup didn’t drop, the Pintos took a 30-second timeout with 2:36 to play in the first quarter.
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"Our kids were jumping up and down like its two minutes left in the fourth quarter," Fick said. "… I talked to our guys that they’re a caliber of team that’s going to put runs together." Top-seeded California managed one run - a 12-0 spurt to end the quarter. Dustin Cook scored seven points during that stretch and demonstrated some of the explosiveness he showed in the semifinals when he scored 19 points against Centralia. When Cook hit a 3-pointer with eight seconds to play in the first quarter, he gave California a 16-10 lead. It was the Pintos’ largest lead of the game and the last time Cook scored. "In practice, we were working on double-teaming Chesser and keeping Cook from penetrating," said Otto, who finished with a team-high 13 points. "Guys did a great job helping off. That really creates problems for" offenses "when you take the best players out of the game. You create habits against them." The Pintos (18-10) went into the locker room leading 20-17 and pushed their lead to 22-17 when Chesser sank both of his free throws with 6:27 remaining in the third quarter, but it was all Blair Oaks after that. The Falcons scored 13 straight points to close out the quarter. Brandon Moore’ 3-pointer with 4:57 to play to put Blair Oaks ahead for good 23-22 and he added a basket 2:05 later. Moore finished with 10 points and was one of four Falcons to score eight points or more. Chesser’s basket with 6:36 remaining in the game brought the Pintos within eight points, 32-24, but Blair Oaks scored the next 11 points and shut out California to secure back-to-back district titles. "They’re both sweet," said Fick, adding, "Last year we came in as the one seed. This year as the two seed, obviously our record is not what it was last year. This year, expectations may not have been as high, but they’re all fun." |
