01/27/2024
BY JACK BULLOCK
HARRISBURG – The dividends are paying off for the Hardin County Cougars.

Head coach Rodney Lane and his club have made the road trips, taken on tough competition and have weathered the storm as part of the learning process.

Each year Hardin County steps up its non-conference schedule and this season this experience has shown in clutch situations.

Saturday night in the title game of the Greater Egyptian Conference Tournament, his kids played like a team that is maturing and jelling at the right time.

The Cougars outscored Gallatin County 15-2 in the second quarter and held off the Hawks late in the game to capture the 73rd annual event, 48-35 in front of a packed house at Southeastern Illinois College in Harrisburg.

According to Coach Lane, his team has struggled offensively this season but one wouldn't know it on Saturday.

Hardin County took care of the ball as they committed just five turnovers, none of which came in the fourth quarter, as they improved to 11-9 overall.

“We have been putting an emphasis on it (offense) day after day in practice and the kids came out tonight really focused,” said Coach Lane. “We got the job done. In the first half we were aggressive going to the basket. Defense is what has gotten us by but if our offense shows up like that. We shut them down in the first half only allowing them 13-points.”

Six-foot senior guard Nick Austin stepped up in a big way for his teammates on this night.

Austin led the club with 21-points as he and his teammates got to the rim on drives in the lane for most of the night as they worked over the Hawks defense, especially in the half-court setting.

Using their overall quickness, the Cougars were able to handle man-to-man defense and zone-traps by Gallatin County for most of the game.

Two other Cougars ended up with double-figures in scoring.

Six-foot sophomore guard Brandon Dutton scored 11-points and senior Morgan Fricker finished with 10.

“It was a team effort, altogether. We came through. We got off to a hot start and played good defense,” said Austin. “We worked on it (offense) today in practice and it really helped us out. It's amazing and I think this will give us momentum for the rest of the season.”

Coach Craig Utterback saw his Hawks rally but they never got closer than seven-points in the final three quarters

Gallatin County fell to 10-14 on the season, after having won six-of-seven games heading into Saturday.

The Hawks were paced in scoring by 6-foot-4 senior forward Noah Richardson with 10-points as he was the only Gallatin County player to have double-digits in scoring.

Senior Lucas Jackson added eight-points and junior Grant Jackson added seven in the defensive minded title tilt.

A five turnover, 1-of-7 second quarter by Gallatin County was too steep a hill to climb to make a full comeback.

Landon Fricker added seven-points for Hardin County and senior point guard Walker Bebout didn't score a point but his work on defense and his five assists were part of the championship game success.

Gallatin County got going first in the early going with Richardson converting a three-point play on an assist from Grant Jackson for a 5-4 lead.

Lucas Jackson scored twice on the inside in the opening frame and Richardson took another assist from Jackson for a 9-8 Hawks' advantage with just over two minutes left in the quarter.

It turned out to be the final scoring advantage for Coach Utterback's club.

Landon Fricker converted on a drive to the basket for an “And-One” and Austin canned a 3-pointer to end the first quarter scoring at 14-11 Cougars.

Coach Lane's squad dominated the second quarter.

Counting the last 3-pointer in the first quarter all the way until halftime, the Hardin County scoring run was 18-2.

Austin nailed down a 3-pointer from the left wing during the second quarter run and added three other scores.

Dutton converted a transition basket and also took an assist from Bebout on a back door cut for a finish.

The final two buckets in the half went to Austin and a jumper from the left wing and a drive in the lane to make it 29-13 at halftime.

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The one run that the Hawks made was to begin the third quarter.

Capitalizing on rare mistakes by Hardin County, Gallatin County scored the first eight-points of the second half.

Both Lucas and Grant Jackson scored to begin the run was followed up by a bucket in the paint from Richardson.

The next points to finish the run came on something you don't see in basketball on any level.

On a dead ball situation, Gallatin County was taking the ball out when Hardin County's Ethan Mitchell went to check in at the scorers' table.

Mitchell walked on to the court while the ball was in play and was whistled for a technical foul.

Senior Mattix Sandifer nailed both technical free throws and suddenly the Gallatin County fan base and team were fired up as they trailed just 29-21.

When you have a team like Hardin County that has already played against some talented teams in front of big crowds, there was no panic coming from the Cougars.

Coach Lane's squad finished the third quarter by outscoring the Hawks 8-6 to push the lead back out to double-digits at 37-27.

Bebout picked up another assist on a score by Morgan Fricker and Austin scored again on a drive.

By this time Hardin County had begun to run their offense to run clock while still looking to score.

A pair of free throws by Dutton ended the quarter with the Cougars in front by ten.

Gallatin put together one last scoring burst with five-points coming on a basket by Lucas Jackson and 3-of-4 total free throws by Wyatt Fromm and Richardson.

While leading 39-32 Hardin County ran its offense and got either easy looks or they backed it out.

Austin scored twice in the quarter with one of the scores coming on a nice lob pass from Landon Fricker.

Landon took another back door pass from Bebout and Dutton closed the scoring with 1-of-2 foul shots with :57.3 remaining.

Reserved closed out the final seconds of the Cougars' second GEC tournament title in the past three seasons.

“We probably got four or five easy buckets off of their trap. We took a couple of shots we probably shouldn't have taken late and when we got that technical in the third quarter we could've quit but the kids didn't,” said Coach Lane. “I'm really proud of them how they fought through the adversity.”

The end results on the stat sheet showed how well the winner's played.

Hardin County closed out the game by hitting 20-of-41 shots overall and out-rebounded the taller Hawks 30-19.

They only allowed Gallatin County five offensive rebounds with three of them coming in the final moments by the reserves after the outcome was decided.

In the Cougars second quarter run, the team's only turnover came with :01 left.

Gallatin County ended up just 13-of-39 overall, 1-of-8 from the 3-point arc.

They ended up with just eight-turnovers but the five in the second quarter fueled the Cougars' take over of the contest.

Hardin County has played against four Southern Illinois River-to-River teams, including two games each against Harrisburg and Massac County along with state-ranked Benton, Anna-Jonesboro and state-ranked 1A Goreville.

“Six of our loses are to River-to-River schools this season and I think it pays off in weeks like this in the tournament,” said Coach Lane. “Tonight was a postseason atmosphere here every year and it's a great experience. I'm proud of this team and what they did tonight.”

Hardin County (48) – Bebout 0 0 0-2 0, Austin 7 2 0-1 21, M. Fricker 5 0 0-0 10, Mitchell 0 0 0-0 0, Dutton 3 0 5-10 11, L. Fricker 3 0 1-1 7, Massie 0 0 0-0 0, Winters 0 0 0-0 0, Heberer 0 0 0-0 0, Banks 0 0 0-0 0, Gibbons 0 0 0-0 0, Fulkerson 0 0 0-0 0, Bedford 0 0 0-0 0. 2FG-18/ 3FG-2/FT-6-14/PF-14.
Gallatin County (35) – L. Jackson 4 0 0-2 8, W. Fromm 1 0 2-3 5, Richardson 4 0 2-4 10, Sandifur 0 0 4-4 4, G. Jackson 2 1 0-2 7, Rushing 1 0 0-0 2, Glover 0 0 0-0 0, T. Fromm 0 0 0-0 0, Rider 0 0 0-0 0, Brannon 0 0 0-0 0. 2FG-12/3FG-1/FT-8-15/PF-16.
Fouled Out – G. Jackson - Gallatin County.
Technical Fouls – None.

CRAB ORCHARD 86, POPE COUNTY 77
The third place game between the Trojans and Pirates was a polar opposite of the championship game that came after the Crab Orchard win.

The two teams combined 121 field goal attempts in a track meet of a contest eventually won by Coach Jon Brown's club as they improved to 16-8 on the season.

Five players scored for the Trojans and all five hit for double-digits in points.

Cameron Clark, a 5-9 junior guard, netted 23-points as he canned four 3-pointers to go with 9-of-10 made free throws.

Senior Ethan Travelstead and junior Carter Watts each scored 19-points.

Senior forward Colton Stover (15) and junior Cameron Dawes (10) added points in the high scoring contest.

Coach Jim Simmons Pirates were topped by cousins Masin Presser and Eli Presser.

Masin, a 6-6 senior guard/forward, scored 40-points for Pope County to go with 14-rebounds.

Eli scored 25-points, including five of the team's eight made 3-pointers.

The difference for the ballgame in scored came from the free throw line as Crab Orchard was 19-of-25 from the foul line with Clark hitting 9-of-10.

Pope County was only 5-of-7 from the stripe in the loss.

The Trojans trailed early 10-4 with 4:21 left in the first quarter before finishing off the quarter with an 18-7 run.
Travelstead and Clark each dialed up long distance with 3-pointers as Crab Orchard led 22-17 at the end of one quarter.

Coach Brown's club scored 30-points in the second quarter with Clark and Travelstead adding two more 3-pointers each to go with Watts scoring nine points in the frame.

A 15-3 run pushed the Trojans to a 46-27 lead with 2:56 left.

Masin Presser scored 16-points in the first half while Eli added 12 as the Pirates trailed 52-35 at intermission.

The Pirates outscored Crab Orchard 23-17 in the fourth quarter to make the final score more respectable.

Masin Presser scored 16-of his points in the final eight minutes.

The Trojans finished 28-of-57 from the floor, 11-of-25 from the 3-point line while Pope County was 33-of-64 overall, 8-of-18 from the arc.

Pope County held a 39-24 rebounding edge but committed 14-turnovers compared to just eight for Crab Orchard.

The Pirates are now 12-10 on the season.

Pope County (75) – Ohse 1 0 1-1 3, Comer 2 0 0-0 4, E. Presser 5 5 0-0 25, M. Presser 15 2 4-6 40, Steele 1 0 0-0 2, Bucher 0 0 0-0 0, Simmons 0 0 0-0 0, Nalley 0 1 0-0 3. 2FG-25/3FG-8/FT-5-7/PF-19.
Crab Orchard (86) – Travelstead 3 3 4-6 19, Clark 1 4 9-10 20, Brotherton 0 0 0-0 0, Watts 7 1 2-5 19, Stover 3 3 0-0 15, Dawes 3 0 4-4 10. 2FG-17/3FG-11/FT-19-25/PF-11.
Fouled Out – Ohse, Comer - Pope County.
Technical Fouls – Ohse - Pope County.

Galatia (60) – Thatcher 1 2 1-1 9, Puckett 1 0 0-0 2, Miller 6 0 3-6 15, Hankins 3 0 4-5 10, Ammon 9 1 1-4 22, Jenkins 1 0 0-0 2, Allen 0 0 0-0 0, Campbell 0 0 0-0 0. 2FG-21/3FG-3, FT-6-11, PF-13.
Norris City-Omaha-Enfield (48) – Prather 1 0 1-2 3, Garrett 2 1 4-4 11, Simmons 6 0 5-5 17, Russell 2 0 0-0 4, Graves 4 0 2-2 10, Sexton 0 1 0-0 3. 2FG-15/3FG-2/FT-12-13/PF-14.
Fouled Out – None.
Technical Fouls – None.