02-07-06
BY JACK BULLOCK
EFFINGHAM - On Tuesday night, it was business as usual for the Teutopolis Wooden Shoes.

Suffocating defense, long-range shooting effectiveness and another National Trail Conference regular season championship are the norm for this program. Yawn!

As reliable as Old Faithful, Death or Taxes, coach Ken Crawford's program will need space for yet another championship trophy.

With its 57-38 win over rival Effingham St. Anthony on the road, T-Town added yet another title to the list.

Behind an outstanding shooting effort from the field to go along with a defensive stand that induced St. Anthony into 13 turnovers - five in the third quarter - Teutopolis improved to 23-2 overall and 8-0 in the NTC.

The victory assured the Shoes of at least a share of the regular season title, Coach Crawford's 17th in 25 years as the head coach at the school.

"I felt we were a little stale offensively in the first half and didn't run the offense very well," explained Crawford. "But in the second half we started to move the basketball around better and when we move it, we got some good shooters and we started executing better."

Those shooters were extremely good on this night in front of a large crowd at St. Anthony's Enloh Center.

The Wooden Shoes were 'laser-like' in accuracy from behind the arc, connecting on 10-of-15 attempts.

Lee Zerrusen canned four of them himself while Matt Crawford (3) Kyle Ruholl (2) and Jason Runde (1) all got into the long-range performance.

"Offensively we knew how they (T-Town) were going to guard us and we dug ourselves a hole tonight and you can't do that against those guys," said St. Anthony coach Mike Wilson.
"My biggest disappointment tonight is that we talked about how to defend their 3-point shooters and out of their 10 made three's, I bet we broke down defensively on nine of them."

Toss in a dominating rebounding performance (29-14) and Coach Crawford had much to be happy about.

But it wasn't a complete 'white washing' and St. Anthony hung tough for the first half while withstanding a big Teutopolis run in the opening quarter.

After a pair of early buckets by the Bulldogs, T-Town 'flipped the switch' on a 14-2 scoring run.

Crawford, a 6-foot-4 senior forward and the coaches' son, showed his worth from outside by hitting his first two 3-pointers in the run.
The second one from the left wing forced a St. A timeout with 1:59 remaining at 11-6 'Shoes.

Six-foot-six junior Jesse Mumm helped keep St. Anthony close early on with six first quarter points.

In fact he and teammate Andy McLeod combined for 16 of the Bulldogs' 21 first half points.

With McLeod scoring from the outside and driving to the basket, and Mumm hitting in close, St. Anthony crawled back to take a brief lead in the second quarter.

An 11-0 run, finished off by a 3-pointer from the right wing by the 6-foot-1 senior McLeod, made it 19-16 Bulldogs at the 2:55 mark.
But that lead, and St. Anthony's chances for victory, were short lived.

Craig Westendorf stepped off of the T-Town bench and scored five points in the late part of the second frame while teammate Jason Runde scored on a rare 4-point play.

Runde connected on a 3-pointer from near the top of the arc while being fouled by Mumm.

His made free throw made it 22-19 'Shoes.

When Westendorf finished the first half scoring with a rebound basket, Teutopolis took a 25-21 lead to the locker room.

The Shoes finished the half with a 9-2 run and opened the third quarter with an even bigger statement.

Scoring the quarter's first seven points, T-Town turned up the heat on both ends of the floor.

Coach Crawford's teams over the years have always been able to make teams pay for mistakes.

This night was 'par for the course' as the Shoes took three consecutive St. Anthony turnovers and turned them into points during the run.

Recognizing that the Bulldogs wanted to get the ball inside to Mumm, Teutopolis denied the passing lanes and its interior defense kept St. Anthony scoreless for a combined 5:50 stretch between the second and third quarters.

Zerrusen's first of four 3-pointers in the stanza made it 32-21 with 4:30 remaining which enticed St. A mentor Mike Wilson to use a timeout.

"In the second half we got out in the passers' faces and denied the passing lanes and Dustin Ruholl did a tremendous job defensively on Jesse Mumm," said Crawford. "He did the job fronting him and he got backside help tonight as well. I think some people question if we can guard teams inside but we have been able to guard teams all year long."

McLeod, who was one of the few bright spots on the night for Coach Wilson, tried to keep his team close with five third quarter points.

But Zerrusen's 12-points on four 'trifecta' kept the Bulldogs on a leash.

His fourth 'bomb' from the left wing, extended the T-Town scoring outburst to 43-28 heading to the final frame.

St. Anthony would get no closer than 13 points the rest of the game.

"They are the best 3-point shooting team we've seen this year," added Wilson, whose team has played some very good teams in the first three months of the season. "At times tonight we did a good job defensively, but when we didn't most of it was just mental breakdowns at key times and you can't do that against someone like T-Town. Mentally tonight we just didn't get the job done."

A final salvo in the form of a 7-0 run by the 'Shoes kicked the score up to 53-32 with just under three minutes to go.

Five-of-six late free throws by T-Town polished off another National Trail regular season title.

T-Town was 18-of-40 overall from the field, but the 10-of-15 from long distance kept the Bulldogs' ears ringing.

Runde led all scorers with 18 points with Zerrusen adding 14. Crawford's three 3's added up to nine points.

McLeod and Mumm chipped in 12 and 11 for the Bulldogs, who saw their record fall to 18-8.

St. Anthony managed just 15-of-44 and 3-of-17 from deep.

When you don't shoot the ball well and you secure just three offensive rebounds, the night will be a long one.

"Mentally right now we are not tough enough to play with good teams and we are going to have to do something about that," added Wilson. "At this point last season we went on our run and got deep into the postseason and we have some things that we have to take care of before we can do that again. They (Teutopolis) made a run tonight and we didn't answer that run with one of our own and that is something that we have to do to win ballgames against good teams. We were doing the right things mentally back around Christmas but we aren't doing those things now."

	1	2	3	4		Final
Teutopolis	14	11	18	14	-	57
St. Anthony	8	13	7	10	-	38

Teutopolis (57) - Crawford 0 3 0-0 9, D. Ruholl 0 0 1-2 1, Zerrusen 1 4 0-0 14, K. Ruholl 0 2 0-0 6, Runde 4 1 7-9 18, Westendorf 3 0 1-3 7, Pals 0 0 2-2 2.
2FG-8, 3FG- 10, FT-11-16, PF-9
Effingham St. Anthony (38) - Huey 0 0 0-0 0, Hook 1 0 0-0 2, Koester 0 0 4-4 4, Bochtler 0 0 0-0 0, Hecht 0 0 0-0 0, Jansen 0 1 0-0 3, McHugh 1 0 0-0 2, McLeod 3 2 0-0 12, Fearday 0 0 0-0 0, Meers 0 0 0-0 0, Steppe 0 0 0-0 0, Mumm 5 0 1-2 11.
Borries 0 0 0-0 0.
2FG-12, 3FG-3, FT-5-6, PF-16.
Fouled Out - None.
Technical Fouls - None.