01-23-13
BY JACK BULLOCK
ALTAMONT –

The year was 1951.

Since that time the Bulldogs had won every single quarterfinal game it played heading into this year's tournament.

That streak came to an end on Wednesday night at Altamont.

Behind a early run in the opening quarter and a third quarter push for separation, Stewardson-Strasburg advanced into the championship round of the 78th annual event with a 65-55 win.

Despite some free throw shooting issues in the fourth quarter and a furious rally by St. A, the Comets left the gym on Wednesday night with a win over a team that had beaten them in a regular season conference matchup five nights earlier.

Head coach Shane Smith's crew got 19-points from 6-foot-4 senior Justin Fulk on the inside and 18-points from 5-foot-11 junior guard Brandon Helmuth, mostly from the outside, as they build a large double-digit lead.

“That is what we talk about, we want to come out with a good first quarter and definitely a good third quarter and keep our momentum going,” said Coach Smith. “We got really tight for about four minutes in the fourth quarter. I think if we had just relaxed a little bit it would have been better. But credit St. Anthony. They came back and put us in a position that we didn't want to be in. they caught us in traps (full court pressure). The bottom line is the game is about the free throw line and if we had hit our free throws we would have had a little more breathing room. But we got the win and that is all that counts.”

St. Anthony's rally fell short despite 20-points from senior Jacob Schuette and 13-points from Charlie Schultz.

A poor offensive start by the Bulldogs combined with a good beginning by Stew-Stras put St. Anthony in an unenviable position.

Coach Mark Tovey's club had to use up a lot of energy in a fourth quarter rally and were out of fuel in the final moments as they fell into the consolation bracket.

“You have to play the entire game and every possession and we created most of our own problems,” said St. Anthony head coach Mark Tovey. “We had turnovers in the first quarter and we made some very bad decisions. We have been having some good practices so it is disappointing because I felt like we had made some steps ahead.”

With Fulk and Helmuth getting off to a good beginning, the Comets jumped out to an 8-0 lead.

St. Anthony's first five possessions ended with turnovers as the Bulldogs surrendered four baskets off of those mistakes.

Senior forward Justin Becker joined Helmuth and Fulk in the scoring parade, hitting a transition score in a the run.

When Helmuth scored on yet another drive to the basket, Stewardson-Strasburg led 17-6 with 2:15 left in the first quarter.

A pair of free throws by Schultz and drive by this 6-foot-2 forward got the Bulldogs to double-figures.

But a basket by senior Jon Luce in the lane closed out the frame at 19-10.

The Comets forged a 13-point halftime lead with a 9-2 run in the second quarter.

Fulk scored two more times in the lane and when senior forward Dylan Roley took an assist from Becker for a basket, Stew-Stras led 35-22 at intermission.

“We did a good job going inside and outside, and that was how we built our lead in the third quarter,” added Coach Smith. “But we have a problem in that sometimes (second quarter) we get to playing faster than what we should be playing. We were playing to fast and not taking the best look (at the basket). If we had slowed down a bit we might have been able to lengthen the lead.”

Coach Smith's club appeared to be headed for an easy win with a big third quarter push where they gradually pulled away.

Fulk and Helmuth each scored seven points in the stanza and both converted conventional three point plays in the run.

Fulk got loose in the paint for a basket while being fouled by sophomore Andrew Gardewine.

Then Helmuth scored on a drive and then converted hit free throw for a 46-28 lead with 4:30 remaining.

Stewardson-Strasburg hit 5-of-6 free throws to open up the fourth quarter and had the game well in hand at 57-38 at the 5:46 mark.

However the Comets came unraveled for a four minute stretch in which Coach Smith's squad failed to convert from the foul line while St. Anthony made its final run.

A three point play by Schultz and a 3-pointer by Neil Williams got St. Anthony started on an 11-1 run that cut the Comets lead to just 58-51.

During that stretch, Stewardson-Strasburg missed 5-of-6 free throws. In the fourth quarter alone, the Comets committed six turnovers.

Nevertheless, the Comets held on as St. Anthony managed to hit just 6-of-22 shots in the fourth quarter as its rally fell short.

In a contest that in the scorebook was nearly identical, the Comets won the game from the foul line.

Despite hitting just 20-of-36 from the charity stripe, Stew-Stras hit 10 more free throws that St. A.

Each team hit the exact same amount of field goals.

Both Stewardson-Strasburg and St. Anthony made 21 2-point field goals and 1 3-point field goal.

The difference is that it took the Bulldogs 20 more total attempts to reach that total.

Effingham St. Anthony finished 22-of-61 overall (36 percent) compared to Stew-Stras who hit a much better percentage (53.6 percent) hitting 22-of-41.

The Comets survived 18-turnovers by making a better percentage of shots and outrebounding the Bulldogs 33-24.

“The energy it takes to do that (rally) it is seldom that you can come back all the way. But the kids didn't fold up,” added Coach Tovey. “We told the kids in the locker room, I don't care what they call it; seventh place, ninth place, consolation championship, I don't care what they want to call it. We are looking at it as a couple of games in which we really need to perform well.”

St. Anthony (55) – Williams 1 1 0-0 5, Z. Gardewine 0 0 0-0 0, J. Schuette 10 0 0-0 20, Gibson 0 0 0-0 0, Schultz 3 0 7-7 13, A. Gardewine 2 0 3-4 7, Hoelscher 3 0 0-2 6, Goeckner 1 0 0-0 2, Vogel 1 0 0-0 2.
2FG-21, 3FG-1, FT-10-13, PF-21.
Stewardson-Strasburg (65) – Helmuth 5 0 8-15 18, Helton 1 0 0-0 2, roley 2 0 0-0 4, Becker 2 0 4-6 8, Luce 3 0 0-0 6, Fry 1 1 3-4 8, Fulk 7 0 5-11 19.
2FG-21, 3FG-1, FT-20-36, PF-13.
Fouled Out – Schuette - St. Anthony.
Technical Fouls – None.

ALTAMONT 38, SOUTH CENTRAL 30
Despite some serious offensive deficiencies on Wednesday in the quarterfinals of the National Trail Conference Tournament, the Altamont Indians survived.

Hitting just 13-of-42 shots, Coach John Niebruegge's team managed to score just enough points, especially in the second half, to eek out a 38-30 win over South Central to reach the final four of the championship bracket.

The Indians won this war by wearing down South Central late in the game.

While they trailed for much of the game, Altamont ended up with the win by going on a 9-1 run during the midway point of the fourth quarter and then fended off the Cougars by hitting 7-of-10 free throws in the final 1:25.

With the game even at 24-all, junior forward Aaron Goeckner gave the Indians the lead for good by nailing a 3-pointer from the top of the circle with 5:01 remaining.

Two drives to the basket by junior guard Garrett Ziegler and those free throws advanced the second-seeded Tribe into the semifinals.

South Central, after surrendering its lead, was just 2-of-10 in the final quarter.

Coach Niebrugge's team struggled finding an offensive rhythm against the Cougars' zone defense.

“We are going to have to get on a ladder and get that lid off the basket,” said Coach Niebrugge, when talking about his teams struggles offensively. “We took care of the ball (seven turnovers) but we just couldn't make shots. We have to find easy baskets. The only way we could score tonight was easy shots off of turnovers.”

But on the other end of the floor, Altamont made South Central earn its points.

The Cougars, behind senior forward Fischer Tharp, jumped out to an 8-3 “grind it out” first quarter advantage.

Tharp scored four of the points and steal and fast break lay in by senior guard Rudy Hablewitz just before the buzzer closed the scoring as Altamont (14-5) started the game 1-of-8 from the floor.

The Indians finally got some shots to fall in the second quarter but South Central held the lead until the final seconds of the half.

Tharp converted a conventional three point play on a drive to the basket and followed that up by knifing through the Altamont defense for another score and a 13-7 lead.

However a peculiar occurrence happened toward the end of the second stanza.

On two different fast break attempts by Ziegler, he was intentionally fouled by South Central's freshman Bret Harmeier.

On those fouls, Ziegler made 3-of-4 free throws.

After the second intentional foul, Altamont scored on a shot in the lane by Justin McGinnis for a 14-13 halftime lead for the Tribe.

South Central (5-14) scored the first eight points of the second half and had the game in hand.

Forward Noah Powless scored twice in the lane and Hablewitz hit a pair of shots for a 21-14 lead.

But the lead wasn't comfortable as the Cougars didn't score again the rest of the quarter.

Altamont, who was struggling in a half-court offense (hitting 1-of-their-first-11 shots) got going by forcing four South Central turnovers and scoring eight consecutive points.

These mistakes turned into three fast break scores.

Ziegler scored twice on lay ins and McGinnis closed the frame with a bucket just before the horn for a 22-21 advantage.

The Cougars shot themselves in the foot by hitting just 2-of-7 free throws in the early part of the final countdown before Altamont changed the game by going on its final run.

Altamont was led in scoring by Ziegler with 15-points. Hit also was very good from the foul line, netting 7-of-10.

Goeckner added seven for the Indians with McGinnis adding six in the low scoring contest.

Despite not hitting a good percentage of shots (28.5 percent) and being outrebounded (29-17) Altamont managed to pick up the win.

The Cougars were topped by Tharp with 14-points while Hablewitz and Powless added seven and six.

South Central hit 12-of-35 shots from the floor (34.2 percent) while committing 13-turnovers.

“All in all I’m really please with the effort. When we got the lead in the third quarter, I told the kids at that point you started to rush things,” said South Central head coach Rick Simmons. “All we really needed to do was keep playing. But we got a little excited. Rudy and Fischer are scorers so they are going to take some shots sometimes when you are going to shake your head. But as I told them, when we had the lead we didn't use our possessions very well.”

South Central (30) – Harmeier 0 0 1-2 1, Hablewitz 3 0 1-4 7, Tharp 5 0 4-6 14, Retermann 0 0 0-0 0, Rose 1 0 0-2 2, Schwarm 0 0 0-0 0, Powless 3 0 0-1 6.
2FG-12, 3FG-0, FT-6-15, PF-19.
Altamont (38) – Ziegler 4 0 7-10 15, Goeckner 1 1 2-2 7, McGinnis 3 0 0-0 6, Seidel 1 0 1-2 3, Hill 0 0 1-2 1, Borders 0 0 0-0 0, Kuhns 2 0 0-0 4, Mayhaus 1 0 0-0 2, Jahraus 0 0 0-0 0.
2FG-12, 3FG-1, FT-11-16, PF-15.
Fouled Out – Tharp - South Central; Kuhns - Altamont.
Technical Fouls – None