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The Paper photo by Lori Poteet
North Montgomery’s boys basketball team won their third-straight Boys’ Sugar Creek Classic title Saturday night. |
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The Paper photo by Lori Poteet
North Montgomery senior D.J. Byrd scored a game-high 34 points in the Chargers’ title-game win. |
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| Boys basketball
Saturday
Sugar Creek Classic
At Southmont HS
Championship game
North Montgomery 65, Crawfordsville 48
Crawfordsville 5 13 19 11 – 48
North Montgomery 13 16 20 16 – 65
Scoring:
Crawfordsville – Quinten Anderson 0-3 0-0 0, Nolan Harris 2-5 0-0 5,
Jordan Boykin 6-10 1-3 11, Tyler Whittington 2-6 5-6 11, Trent Crabtree
2-7 1-2 7, Caleb Rasmussen 1-3 1-1 3, Brett McKinney 1-2 0-0 2, Klajdi
Osmani 0-2 0-0 0, Michael Demeter 2-3 0-0 5, Evan Morgan 1-2 2-2 4,
Brad Wethington 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 17-43 10-14 48. North Montgomery –
Clay Pierce 4-10 1-2 10, Colin Maltsberger 3-7 1-6 8, Kal Airey 0-1 0-0
0, D.J. Byrd 15-23 0-0 34, Kyle Kingma 2-2 0-0 4, Jake Thomas 1-3 0-0
2, Austin Krutzsch 1-1 0-0 2, Andrew Airey 2-6 0-0 5, Jordan Galloway
0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 28-53 2-8 65.
Three-point shooting:
Crawfordsville 3-10 (Anderson 0-1, Whittington 1-2, Crabtree 2-4,
McKinney 0-1, Osmani 0-1, Demeter 1-1), North Montgomery 7-17 (Pierce
1-2, Maltsberger 1-3, Byrd 4-10, A. Airey 1-2)
Rebounds: Crawfordsville 26 (Boykin 7), North Montgomery 31 (Byrd 10, Pierce 6)
Fouls: Crawfordsville 17, North Montgomery 18
Turnovers: Crawfordsville 20, North Montgomery 9
Records: North Montgomery 8-3, Crawfordsville 4-5
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Reprinted courtesy of:
The Paper of Montgomery County
www.thepaper24-7.com
By John Groth
Sports Editor
NEW MARKET – D.J. Byrd kept county-rival Crawfordsville off guard.
North
Montgomery High School’s senior standout took control of the Sugar
Creek Classic with his off-the-ball movement, dashing past defenders
and darting around screens.
Now, they’ve got their three-peat and Byrd earned his, too.
Byrd
scored a game-high 34 points, including 21 in the second half, to lift
North Montgomery to a 65-48 victory over county- and Sagamore Athletic
Conference rival Crawfordsville in the third-annual Boys’ Sugar Creek
Classic championship game at Southmont.
North Montgomery has won all three Sugar Creek Classic titles and has yet to lose a game in the tournament.
“I’ve
been working on moving without the ball all week, making myself more
versatile and keeping defenders guessing so that the defense doesn’t
know what to do. That’s the best way to play as an offensive player,”
said Byrd, who was named the Sugar Creek Classic’s MVP for the third
consecutive year. “It’s a good achievement. We want to win
championships, no matter what it is. That’s what we did tonight.”
It’s
the second straight year North Montgomery (8-3) defeated Crawfordsville
(4-5) in the Sugar Creek Classic title game and the Chargers’ seventh
consecutive victory over the Athenians overall.
The win was also Chargers’ coach Scott Radeker’s 100th career victory during his eight-year tenure at the school.
“I
told assistant coach [Ken] Hampton, we have a chance to get to 100
tonight, not just me,” Radeker said. “It’s all due to the great players
we’ve had here.”
Although Byrd didn’t top his career- and Sugar
Creek Classic high of 41 set in last year’s title game, he was every
bit as dominant.
Byrd scored from inside and outside, working the post in the first half and then burying three-pointers in the second half.
After
scoring 13 points and picking up three fouls – including a technical
with 1:56 remaining in the second quarter – Byrd was sent to the bench
by Radeker to settle down.
His anger dissipated but his shot stayed hot.
Byrd scored 11 of North Montgomery’s first 13 third-quarter points to keep the Chargers up by double-digits.
Byrd finished 15-of-23 from the field and hit 4-of-10 thee-point attempts.
“I
told him to keep his mouth shut and play,” Radeker said. “He caught the
ball of offensive screens and did a good job passing the ball in a
timely fashion.”
North Montgomery senior Clay Pierce (10 points)
and senior Colin Maltsberger (eight points) joined Byrd on the Sugar
Creek Classic All-Tournament team, along with Crawfordsville senior
Jordan Boykin (11 points), Southmont sophomore Trent Murray and Western
Boone senior Aaron Vaughn.
Crawfordsville coach John Blackwell, meanwhile, was frustrated.
After
dominating the rebounding battle and controlling the paint in a Friday
semifinal game against Southmont, the Mounties lost both areas Saturday
night.
They also struggled with turnovers. Halfway through the
second quarter, the Athenians had more turnovers than field goal
attempts.
They finished with 20 turnovers overall, with 13 coming in the first half.
Blackwell took all his starters and put five back-ups in to start the third quarter.
They went on an 8-4 run, but Byrd’s threes widened the gap up again.
“I
was just trying to win the game,” Blackwell said. “The guys on the
floor weren’t getting it done. I didn’t feel like we had a chance with
the way we were playing and with the guys we were playing.”
North
Montgomery next plays Friday at conference rival Danville, while
Crawfordsville travels to North Vermillion for a Saturday night game.
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