12-11-13
BY JACK BULLOCK
GOREVILLE – Heading into Wednesday nights’ final session of the Goreville Invitational Tournament any of the four remaining combatants could have taken home the crown.

With head-to-head results tantamount as the first tiebreaker, Anna-Jonesboro needed a win over Benton and a Goreville loss to Johnston City to claim the top prize.

As it turned out, Coach Mike Chamness and his club got to hang around and pick up the hardware as its 56-52 win over Benton and the Indians wild victory over the host Blackcats gave the Wildcats the championship.

A-J got balanced scoring with four Wildcats inking the book with double-digits.

Six-foot-seven senior center Ben McFarland led the way with 13-points while junior guard Noah Fuller added 12. Noah Prater and Damian Reed added 11 and 10-points respectively as Coach Chamness’ club held off a furious rally by the Rangers to end their week at 3-1.

Benton saw its mark slip to 2-2 on the week despite an all-out blitz in the fourth quarter that nearly erased all of a 16-point deficit.

The Rangers got 10-points each from 5-foot-10 senior guard Tyler Owens, freshman guard Derek Oxford and junior guard Dakota Head.

Coach Ron Winemiller saw his squad rally from long range with Owens hitting a pair of 3-point shots during the frantic fourth.

However the rally fell short as Anna-Jonesboro made just enough free throws and defensive plays down the stretch to salvage the win.

A team that went just 5-23 last season, the Wildcats are learning how to win on the job.

After back-to-back buckets by McFarland and Prater gave the Wildcats a commanding 49-33 lead with 3:40 remaining, the Rangers went offensive lunacy on A-J.

Launching bombs and creating Wildcat errors, the Rangers got the crowd going with a 9-0 run to get the team believing in a miracle.

A drive to the basket by sophomore Chase Owens, a Trey McDaniel score followed by Kruz Hayes bucket got the ball rolling.

Then on the next try Tyler Owens hit his first of two daggers to get Benton to within 49-42.

“I look up at the scoreboard and we are up 49-33 and they kind of came after us and applied some pressure. McFarland had a couple of 15-footers miss and that is his shot. It is hard to tell the kids not to shoot it when they have open looks,” said Coach Chamness. “He missed a couple of them and that led to some fast break points for them. It is hard to tell them not to shoot it but they (the kids) have to know the situation. But I’m happy that we hung on and made some free throws down the stretch.”

Oxford then got into the routine scoring twice on drives to the basket with his second one resulting in a conventional three-point play.

His made free throw made the scoreboard read 51-47 Anna-Jonesboro with :58 remaining.

Benton got to within two points twice in the final seconds but couldn’t get the lead.

Owens hit his final trey and followed that up with two additional free throws.

However his last 3-point attempt with just a few seconds left fell short.

Reed hit his final free throw of a two-shot opportunity with :03.3 remaining to end the drama.

Anna-Jonesboro changed the complexion of the contest in the third quarter, opening up a double-digit lead.

The Wildcats, who led 22-20 at halftime, stormed out of the break with a 9-0 run.

Sparked by five points by Zach Parr, including a conventional three-point play, A-J was on the march.

A back door score from 6-foot-4 senior Jay Kemp on a pass from Parr along with a steal and fast break slam dunk by McFarland made it 31-20 at the 5:25 mark.

While holding Benton to just five points in the frame, Anna-Jonesboro close the quarter with another conventional three-point play by Reed and another steal and fast break score (Fuller) for a 36-25 edge heading home.

Despite a 7-of-17 shooting performance in the final stanza along with four turnovers, A-J survived.

The Wildcats finished 21-of-46 from the floor overall (45.6 percent) while holding a slight 34-31 rebounding edge.

Benton was just 19-of-57 overall (33.3 percent) but they did finally heat up in the final eight minutes.

The Rangers committed 12-turnovers that also proved costly.

“We were up two at halftime and we talked about in the next four minutes we want to push this thing to seven or nine. We did a good job of separating ourselves from them,” added Coach Chamness. “There at the end they hit some shots. Owens hit a couple of 3’s but our kids kept playing and playing. You get to that point where you don’t want to play not to lose. You want to keep playing to win. Our kids fought and were able to close it out.”

Anna-Jonesboro (56) – Fuller 4 0 4-4 12, Prater 2 2 1-2 11, Parr 2 0 1-3 5, Prather 0 0 0-0 0, Earnhart 0 0 0-0 0, Reed 1 2 2-3 10, James 0 0 0-0 0, McFarland 6 0 1-2 13, Kemp 2 0 1-2 5, Marks 0 0 0-0 0.
2FG-17, 3FG-4, FT-10-16, PF-14.
Benton (52) – C. Owens 0 0 0-0 0, Gibbs 0 0 0-0 0, McDaniels 2 0 1-2 5, T. Owens 1 2 2-2 10, Oxford 4 0 2-3 10, Hayes 4 0 0-0 8, Higgins 0 2 0-0 6, Simpson 0 0 0-0 0, Head 1 2 2-4 10, Dawson 0 0 0-0 0.
2FG-13, 3FG-6, FT-8-12, PF-11.
Fouled Out – Parr - Anna-Jonesboro.
Technical Fouls – None.

JOHNSTON CITY 92, GOREVILLE 85
In a contest where no shot was out of the question and defense was just an option, the Indians sprinted out to a 12-2 lead over the hosts and never let Goreville have the advantage.

Six-foot-two senior Luke McCormick was the leader of the barrage of three point shots as the Indians (3-1 in the tournament, 3-2 overall) led wire-to-wire and led by as many as 17-points in the second half before the Blackcats rally.

McCormick led all gunners with 26-points, including five 3-pointers, while classmate Hunter Zeigler chipped in 22-points, mostly on drives to the basket.

Six-foot-three senior Jake Davison (18-points) and 6-foot-2 senior Derek Smith (13-points) were the other two JC players in double-figures.

Having played three games previously in two days (weather) that included a loss Tuesday night against Carterville outside of tournament play, the Indians could have used fatigue as an excuse.

But Coach Wade Thomas and his troops, playing just seven players on the night, showed no signs of exhaustion in the 32-minute contest.

Johnston City looked fresh in the beginning as they outscored Goreville (3-1) 30-18 in the opening quarter.

“The thing that I’m proudest of is that we have had a heck of a week. We played two on Monday. We play Anna and Egyptian. We go Tuesday and play one of the better teams in southern Illinois in Carterville. Then we come down here with no preparation (for Goreville) our guys competed their butts off tonight,” said Coach Thomas. “I’m really proud of them.”

Kyfer Cavins, Goreville’s 6-foot-1 senior guard, topped the ‘Cats with 20-points and he netted seven of those in the opening salvo.

Six-foot-four senior Zeke Snell added 16-points while Goreville got 15 and 14-points from Dallas Melot and Shon Messmer.

Trailing 67-50 after Johnston City’s Levi Tanner dialed up a 3-pointer from the right corner with 1:34 left in the third quarter, the Blackcats began chipping away at the lead.

A 3-point bomb by Messmer and a drive down the lane by Snell for a one-handed slam dunk got the deficit down to just 74-66 with 6:14 remaining in the fourth quarter.

The final move was s 6-0 run with Goreville’s Daniel Lanham, Messmer and Snell all scoring.

Snell’s two free throws with 1:45 to go cut the JC edge to just 84-83.

But that was the end of the comeback as Johnston City responded by running nearly a minute off of the clock before Zeigler drove the lane for a backbreaking score.

The Indians hit 6-of-8 free throws to close out the victory.

Coach Thomas’ club was 31-of-56 overall from the field (55.3 percent) while connecting from long range at a 62.5 percent clip (10-of-16) in the high scoring affair.

“We kept thinking ‘they can’t shoot like this for the whole game?’ but they did,” said Coach Todd Tripp. “They had some guys tonight that probably don’t shoot that well shoot the ball well tonight. “There guys played hard and our guys played hard and they just beat us tonight.”

The Blackcats were 30-of-70 firing away (42.8 percent) while hitting just 7-of-20 from beyond the arc.

Goreville held a slight rebounding edge (36-29) and had just 11-turnovers compared to 14 miscues from the Tribe.

“You look at this team and we have a lot of seniors and when they (Goreville) made their run and Cavins was getting shots to fall and Snell was dunking on us, I saw our guys start tugging on their shorts. I told them ‘Boys I know your gutted but lets just gut it out for a couple of more minutes. And we did,” finalized Coach Thomas. “Hunter (Zeigler) made a couple of plays and we got to the line and withstood their flurry.”

Goreville (85) – Vaughn 0 0 0-1 0, Lanham 2 2 2-2 12, Cavins 7 0 6-9 20, Madden 1 2 0-0 8, Bishop 0 0 0-0 0, Snell 6 0 4-6 16, Messmer 2 3 1-2 14, Schuetz 0 0 0-0 0, Troop 0 0 0-0 0, Melot 5 0 5-8 15.
2FG-23, 3FG-7, FT-18-28, PF-23.
Johnston City (92) – Tanner 0 2 2-4 8, Zeigler 9 0 4-7 22, McCormmick 2 5 7-8 26, Smith 1 2 5-6 13, Davison 7 1 1-2 18, Burns 0 0-0 4, Brunk 0 0 1-2 1.
2FG-21, 3FG-10, FT-20-29, PF-22.
Fouled Out – Messmer - Goreville.
Technical Fouls – Goreville Bench.