02-08-08
BY JACK BULLOCK
ALTAMONT - Sometimes a team can make its own luck.

On Friday night in a showdown of two of the top clubs in the National Trail Conference – the Altamont Indians outworked their visitors from St. Elmo and took a huge step toward the programs' first outright NTC boy's regular season championship.

As it only seemed fitting the host club seemed to get every loose ball and every important rebound in holding off the Eagles 68-59 to improve to 7-0 in the league and 21-4 overall.

Coach Doug Hill has his team on the brink of history and - with a win next Tuesday night at Effingham St. Anthony - the Indians can stake claim to a least a share of the conference championship. If successful on the road a win at home against rival Stewardson-Strasburg next Friday could give the outright title to the Indians for the first time since 1979-80 campaign.

“Two teams played well tonight and someone had to lose the game and we knew someone was going to leave here unhappy,” said Coach Hill. “We got under control in the end and sealed the win.”

From the outside there are not many teams that can put multiple players on the floor that can hit 3-point shots.

The Indians are one of those squads.

Four different players hit big shots from behind the arc and the Indians backcourt played well enough defensively to force 14 St. Elmo turnovers including six steals in the victory.

Kieffer McCarron was the top point man for the Tribe with 18 points in the contest. He was also part of the problem for the Eagles as he made a pair of big steals which resulted in coast-to-coast scores. Throw in a couple of 3-point bombs on the McCarron game summary.

While McCarron was scoring from the backcourt – Bryce Beccue was having his way inside for the Orange and Black.

Beccue picked up seven field goals – all in close – and a couple of free throws for 16 markers.

St. Elmo's Colton Booher led his club with 15 points and a game-high 16 rebounds.

But he and his teammates stumbled out of the gate and never got into enough of an offensive flow to make any serious runs at Altamont.

Even though the Eagles got a couple of leads – those advantages lasted just moments.

The Indians were 25-of-51 overall from the floor and hit 5-of-15 from behind the arc.

Not too impressive from 20-foot plus but much better than St. Elmo - who hit on just 8-of-27 from the arc – a stat not lost on head coach Greg Feezel.

“They (Altamont) are too good of a team to turn the ball over and shoot poorly against,” said Coach Feezel – who saw his club slip to 16-8 on the season. “The whole thing tonight is that I wanted to get the ball inside tonight and the kids just didn't do what the scouting report said we should do. We needed to get the ball inside.”

Altamont used a combination of zone and man-to-man defenses to force outside shots on this night and it paid off according to Coach Hill.

“We know that they (St. Elmo) can shoot and that is a scary proposition allowing them to shoot from outside,” said Hill talking about his zone strategy to close off the inside defensively. “We were at home and we felt like until they worked up a sweat that they might struggle shooting the ball early and that worked for us tonight. Down at their place we probably wouldn't do that but tonight it worked here.”

Altamont jumped out to an 8-1 lead thanks in part to an awful shooting start from their rivals.

St. Elmo missed 10-of-11 shots to begin the game as the Indians were in control from the outset.

McCarron scored the first two buckets for Altamont in transition.

This 6-foot junior wing player made a steal and went the length of the floor for a 4-0 Indians lead with under a minute gone in the opening quarter.

Following a 1-of-2 effort from Shad Hill from the line for St. Elmo – Curt Heiden connected in the lane and Landon Duckwitz made a steal and fed teammate Justin Durbin with a nice pass for a fast break lay in which forced an Eagle timeout with 3:49 left.

A bright spot in the first half was the shooting of Fletcher Morrison for St. Elmo.

Morrison made a trio of 3-pointers in the opening half with his first one cutting the Altamont lead to 10-8 with :48 remaining in quarter number one.

Beccue closed out the first quarter scoring with a drive to the basket leaving Altamont on top 12-8.

St. Elmo finally got its offense in gear in the second quarter and had its best success in a three-minute stretch where they outscored their hosts 11-5 to take a 23-19 lead with just 3:39 left before intermission.

Morrison hit his other two 3-pointers in the scoring surge and teammate Richard Waterman also got into the long range act with a trifecta of his own to close the run from the right wing.

However - as all good teams do – Altamont retaliated.

Thirteen of the games next fifteen points belonged to the Indians to close out the half at 32-25.

Eleven of those points were put into the column reserved for McCarron.

He scored on a drive to the basket and a 3-pointer from the left wing to give the lead back to Altamont for good with 2:52 left.

He closed the scoring sprint with a drive to the lane which resulted in a conventional three-point play while being fouled by Waterman.

His 3-pointer from the right side of the court with under a minute remaining sent the teams to the lockers.

McCarron – as he did in the first quarter – got the Indians going in the opening moments of the third frame with a steal and fast break to push the lead to 34-25 with 7:42 showing on the clock.

The lead reached double-digits for the first time when Durbin hit from long range to push the lead to 37-27.

Wade Nevergall – a 6-foot senior for St. Elmo – scored 12 points on the night for Coach Feezel.

His first of two 3-pointers along with a steal and transition bucket by Booher got the Eagles back close at 44-38 with 1:16 to go.

But as they had done throughout the contest – Altamont matched every St. Elmo move.

Another score on a fast break – this time by Justin Heiden - along with a free throw by Duckwitz pushed the lead back to nine.

A David Cameron 15-footer with less than thirty seconds left closed the gap for St. Elmo to 47-40 heading to the final quarter.

The Eagles final move came at the beginning of that final stanza.

Nevergall, Booher and Cameron all produced points in a 7-1 run to cut the lead to 48-47.

Booher picked up yet another rebound on a tip-in and Cameron closed run with a 3-pointer from the right corner.

“We all know that they (St. Elmo) are a very good team and we knew that they would make a run,” added Hill. “Tonight we got it stopped in time.”

Altamont closed the book with a 9-2 run highlighted by four more points from Beccue and a 3-point dagger from Curt Heiden.

Beccue took a nice assist from Heiden for a basket and later grabbed a missed 3-pointer from McCarron and stuck it home to make it 52-47.

Then Curt Heiden found himself open for a great look at the basket and drill home his only 3-pointer of the night.

A Justin Heiden transition basket closed the run at 57-49.

The Eagles would get no closer than five points the rest of the night.

Six consecutive free throws converted by Altamont in the final 1:11 put the Indians in place to add an important trophy to the case next week.

“They (Altamont) are a good team. They have twenty-some wins for a reason,” added Coach Feezel. “We didn't have the intensity we needed tonight for this type of ballgame.”

St. Elmo hit on just 21-of-61 shots from the field overall and wasted an impressive rebounding advantage (38-28) by committing too many untimely mistakes.

Behind Booher and Nevergall in scoring was Morrison and Waterman with 11 points each.

Altamont can point to its 20-of-36 showing in two-point field goals on the night and the overall guard play that frustrated the Eagles.

The Indians have simply too many outside shooters for most teams to defend.

“That is the make up of this group and we saw it this summer,” said Coach Hill. “We got to the point that we changed our whole offensive setup just to get these guys some more looks from the outside and more time on the floor. Normally in the past we haven't had this many kids that could shoot it from the outside.”

Following McCarron and Beccue on the hit parade were Alec Braach with nine points followed by seven points each from Duckwitz and Durbin.

The Indians will head to St. Anthony on Tuesday night with the NTC title on the line and Coach Hill and his kids finally talked about it after the win Friday night.

“We hadn't talked about this before tonight but we won tonight so we talked about it in the locker room after the win,” added Hill. “I figured I have to talk about it with them because if I don't they are going to hear about it or read about it from somebody else. We explained the situation to them and they are smart kids so I think they realize the importance of the conference title and it is starting to sink in.”

St. Elmo (59) - Morrison 1 3 0-0 11, Waterman 3 1 2-2 11, Cameron 1 1 0-0 5, Booher 5 1 2-4 15, Nevergall 2 2 2-2 12, Fritcher 0 0 2-2 2, Hill 1 0 1-2 3.
2FG-13, 3FG-8, FT-9-12, PF-20.
Altamont (68) - Duckwitz 2 0 3-4 7, Durbin 1 1 2-2 7, Beccue 7 0 2-6 16, McCarron 5 2 2-4 18, Braach 1 1 4-4 9, J. Heiden 3 0 0-0 6, C. Heiden 1 1 0-1 5.
2FG-20, 3FG-5, FT-13-21, PF-14.
Fouled Out - None.
Technical Fouls - None.