02-24-05
BY JACK BULLOCK
PINCKNEYVILLE - When Steeleville and Waltonville met for the first time back on December 4th at the Trico Invitational Tournament, Steeleville's Adam Eggemeyer lit up the Spartans with eight 3-pointers in a 70-50 win.

On Thursday night at the Pinckneyville Class A Regional it was teammate Tyler Tiemann who stepped up with some key second half baskets.

The 6-foot senior guard scored six points in a pivotal part of the third quarter, points that gave the momentum back to Steeleville in the Warriors' 55-44 win. The two seniors (Eggemeyer and Tiemann) combined for 34-of-the-55 Steeleville points in the win.

Coach Matt Laur's club racked up victory number 26 on the season over a scrappy young Waltonville team that had won 14-of-15 games heading into the rematch between the two schools.

Eggemeyer led the Warriors with 20 points but it was Tiemann with those six third quarter points (14 for the game) that pushed the Warriors into their second consecutive regional title game.

They will face Pinckneyville, the team that eliminated them in the final game of the Trico Regional last March.

"Tyler (Tiemann) has a heart the size of this world and he does whatever it takes to win and he is not going to let this team lose," said Laur about Tiemann, who went over the 1,000 point total for his prep career in the contest
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The Spartans did nearly everything that they wanted to in the game, short of one simple part of any contest.

They didn't shoot the ball well for the entire night, hitting on only 18-of-58 shots from the field and only 4-of-10 from the foul line.

Despite those numbers, the Spartans were never very far behind and seemed ready at any second of the second half to eventually make a run at the Warriors.

But the big run that they needed never came about, due mainly to a 6-of-21 effort from the field in the final quarter.

One of the bright spots for the Spartans tonight was the play of 5-foot-10 junior Adam Kitowski.

This shooting guard hit for a game-high 22 points, which included all four of the Waltonville 3-pointers in the contest.

Going man-to-man on the defensive end instead of a zone that they used in the first meeting between the two schools, the Spartans gave Steeleville some early problems.

However they squandered some early chances and played from behind for nearly the entire night.
Steeleville jumped out on Waltonville like they did in the two teams' first encounter.

Riding the strength of five Eggemeyer points, including a 3-pointer from the left corner with 2:49 left, the Warriors ran out to a 9-2.

But unlike the first game, Waltonville responded.

Jordan Norris, who as the only Spartan senior, scored his only basket of the night on a rebound with 2:22 to go.

Brandon Spotanski, the Spartans' 6-foot-8 center, also cashed in on an offensive rebound in the last part of the quarter that resulted in points in the paint.

Kitowski canned his first 'trey' of the night on an assist from Anthony Lowery with :05 remaining, making it 15-10 Steeleville at the first break.

Two early buckets in the second quarter showed how dangerous a player Kitowski can be.

Two separate drives to the basket resulted in points.

His second 'floater' in the lane brought the Waltonville crowd into the game as his shot cut the Steeleville lead down to 15-14 with 5:12 remaining before intermission.

After a pair of baskets from Dustin Wathen (from the left block) and Eggemeyer (a 17-footer from the right corner) gave Steeleville some additional breathing room, Kitowski scored five more points to even the score.

A pull up shot in the lane followed by his second 'trifecta' evened the contest at 19-all with 3:07 before intermission.

Norris scored the final points of his career as his 1-of-2 free throws with 2:10 left gave the Spartans a brief lead at 20-19.

Steeleville's Josh Jausel matched Norris' 1-of-2 from the line and the two teams had played 16 minutes with the game tied at 20.

But the most important part of the Jausel march to the charity stripe was how the 6-foot-1 junior got there.

He forced Spotanski's second personal foul with 1:24 left, sending the Spartan center to the bench.

Even though Waltonville connected on just 8-of-22 first half shots, the Spartans were in the hunt for an upset win heading into the second half.

Coming out in the second half, it didn't take long before Steeleville turned the pressure cooker up a notch on the Spartans.

Tiemann's six quick points came just after a Spotanski rebound basket gave Waltonville its final lead at 22-21 with 6:26 left.

It took just seven seconds for Tiemann to race to the other end for a score against a napping Spartan defense.

He scored again after another Waltonville empty offensive trip on another drive to the basket.

Spotanski, who had already picked up his third personal foul, spent the next few minutes on the Spartan pine.

In his absence, the Warriors' pressure defense employed by Coach Laur began to take effect on the Waltonville offense and the middle opened up for drives to the basket.

The Warriors picked up four steals in the quarter, three by Travis Schaber.

Two of them resulted in quick points. Eggemeyer collected another 3-pointer from the right corner after one of Schaber's pilfers, making it 28-22 and forcing Coach Denault to use a full timeout at 5:11 left.

"I focused in the locker room talking about picking up the intensity on defense in the second half and we went to the press and played a little harder in our man-to-man defense," said Laur, who in his initial season as a head coach has an opportunity to win his first regional title.
"We executed our offense much better in the second half. In the first half we didn't set good screens and we weren't moving well without the basketball but we did a much better job in the second half."

Tiemann scored again on the next Steeleville trip as the Warriors increased the pressure and its lead.

Kitowski continued to hold the Spartans together on the offensive end.

His third 3-pointer of the game made it 30-25.

However Eggemeyer was getting more into the flow of the offense and he scored a pair of baskets in the next brief Steeleville run.

A tip in of a miss by Jausel and later a back door score on a pass from Tiemann extended the Warriors spread to 36-27.

Another bright spot for Waltonville was four points off the bench by sophomore reserve Seth McGovern. His score on a rebound basket and later two more points on a drive to the basket finished the quarter at 37-29 Steeleville.

"When they (Steeleville) went to the '1-2-2' 3/4 court press they got a couple of steals off of it because we didn't handle the pressure very well," said Coach Mike Denault."They (the Warriors) wore us down some tonight in the second half. We got into some foul trouble and we don't rebound the ball very well when we got either Jon Kash or Brandon Spotanski on the bench. They took advantage tonight of some of our bad decisions."

Kitowski opened up the final quarter of the season for Waltonville with yet another drive to the basket, this time scoring on a left-handed shot that trimmed the Steeleville advantage to 37-31.

Unfortunately for Coach Denault's club, that would be as close as they would get the rest of the game.

Another Tiemann score in the lane and 3-of-4 free throws on successive trips by Eggemeyer gave the Warriors their first double-digit advantage at 46-35 with 4:27 to go.

Two scores; one by Jon Kash and again by Kitowski after the Waltonville guard picked Eggemeyer's pocket and scored on a fast break lay in had the Spartans down just 46-39.

But Schaber delivered the final nail in the Waltonville coffin on the next Steeleville possession.

Taking a pass in the left corner, Schaber's 3-pointer found the 'bottom of the net' to extend the lead back to ten at 49-39.

Schaber scored twice more on a back door pass from Eggemeyer and later two consecutive free throws to finish off the Spartans.

A window dressing 'NBA range' 3-pointer from Kitowski and a Kash rebound basket ended the scoring for Waltonville as their season came to an end.

"I thought we were right there for most of the night and up until about two minutes to go I thought we still had a chance to win the ballgame," said Denault. "The 3-pointer from Schaber was the final blow to us. But we have no complaints tonight, my kids played hard and showed a lot of heart out there on the court."

Steeleville finished the game shooting 50 percent from the field overall, hitting 21-of-42 from the field.

Waltonville out-rebounded the Warriors 31-25 but their problems putting the ball in the basket overshadowed their 'glass work.'

"We are not hanging our heads about this game. We took some big steps in the last two or three weeks of the season and we are really excited about the way things are going for us," Denault said in closing.

After Kitowski's 22 points, Jon Kash scored nine points with Spotanski and McGovern added four each.
Schaber and Wathen each contributed nine points, as the Warriors clearly didn't look past Waltonville.

"We didn't take them lightly tonight. We knew they were a good club and improved from the first time we played them," Laur explained. "Any team that wins 20-games is a good team and we knew we had to come out and play if we were going to beat them again."

The Warriors will play the host Panthers Friday night in the title tilt scheduled for 7:30 pm at Duster Thomas Gym.

Waltonville (44) - Norris 1 0 1-2 3, Kitowski 5 4 0-0 22, Lowery 0 0 2-4 2, J. Kash 4 0 1-4 9, Spotanski 2 0 0-0 4, McGovern 2 0 0-0 4, Owens 0 0 0-0 0, A. Kash 0 0 0-0 0, Kubiak 0 0 0-0 0.
2FG-14, 3FG-4, FT-4-10, PF-19.
Steeleville (55) - Tiemann 7 0 0-0 14, Eggemeyer 4 2 6-9 20, Schaber 2 1 2-2 9, Jasel 1 0 1-2 3, Wathen 4 0 1-2 9, Hochmuth 0 0 0-0 0, Gueber 0 0 0-0 0, Uchtman 0 0 0-0 0.
2FG-18, 3FG-3, FT-10-17, PF-12.
Fouled Out - None.
Technical Fouls - None.