Anderson Highland Scots: Welcome
Indiana HS basketball
Gotta Love it!
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| Grant Fulton and Kaleb Ogden |
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| Jay Mohr Shoots | |
Phil Spoljaric marveled at the stat sheet Friday. His Highland Scots had hit just 23 of a whopping 72 field-goal attempts, yet managed to come back from an 11-point deficit to defeat Lapel 63-58 in overtime at Bob Fuller Memorial Gymnasium. “We hit 23 of (72) and win?” Spoljaric asked in disbelief. “That’s ugly basketball ... but the kids never stopped working.” Indeed, the Scots (2-3) rallied after falling behind 19-8 at the end of the first quarter. They helped force the Bulldogs (3-1) into 27 turnovers while committing just 12 themselves. They also outrebounded Lapel 44-33 despite giving the Bulldogs plenty of opportunities for boards by missing 49 shots. “Our defense was the reason we came back,” said Highland’s Jay Mohr, who finished with a team-high 18 points while hitting 8 of 11 free throws, including 7 of 10 in the fourth quarter and overtime. “After the first half, we picked it up. We know what it’s like to lose, and so we put in the extra effort to win.” Highland appeared to have completed the comeback with six seconds to go in regulation, after Mohr hit a pair of free throws to lead, 51-49. Lapel coach Jimmie Howell called a timeout, and the Bulldogs ran a set play. Point guard Brooks Busch dribbled the ball upcourt, penetrated and found Logan Ingle wide open on the weak side for a layup as time expired. Howell said the play had four options, two of which were 3-pointers, but that it was up to Busch to choose the best option. “Luckily, we were able to execute the way we wanted to,” Howell said. “We battled and competed really well, but we played too loose with the ball when we had the lead.” The Scots took control quickly in overtime. Bench player Kaleb Ogden hit a 3-pointer to open the scoring, his second big basket down the stretch, to give Highland a 54-51 lead. Mohr followed with a fast-break layup off a Lapel miss to make it 56-51 Scots just 31 seconds into the overtime period. Ingle responded with a 3-point play, but Highland scored the next six points, all on free throws, to build a 62-54 cushion. The Scots’ lead never shrank below the final five-point margin after that. Ogden also hit a transition layup with 46 seconds left in regulation that gave Highland a 49-48 lead. It was only the second lead the Scots held in the entire game to that point. Tyson McKinney’s 3-pointer with 4:55 left game Highland its first lead, 43-42, but Lapel responded with back-to-back baskets to take a 46-43 edge. Mohr led Highland’s balanced scoring effort with 18 points, followed by McKinney (16), Tealgil Stonewall (12) and Grant Fulton (10 points and a game-high 11 rebounds). Lapel’s Ingle led all scorers with 21 points, but the Bulldogs’ scoring dropped off substantially after that. Busch finished with 11 points, Seth Bays had nine and Trent Crandall had eight points and a team-best 10 rebounds. The Bulldogs hit 8 of their 12 first-quarter field-goal attempts en route to building their 19-8 edge. Highland, meanwhile, hit just 4 of 20 first-quarter tries. “We didn’t shoot well early in the game, but as the game went on, we started feeling pretty good,” Ogden said. “I was glad I could contribute.”
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Sunday, November 25
The Highland Scots didn’t quite kick off the 2007-08 boys basketball season exactly how they wanted, but on Saturday night, center Grant Fulton helped right the ship. Coming off a 75-68 road loss to Class 3A Yorktown, the Class 4A Scots built a 17-point lead in the second half against the Shamrocks, eventually winning 71-64 at Westfield High School. Fulton scored a game-high 26 points as Highland evened its record at 1-1 with two more road games ahead before the program’s scheduled home opener against Class 1A Lapel on Dec. 7. Against the Class 4A Westfield Shamrocks (0-1), the Scots had three players reach double figures. Tyson McKinney scored 15 points, shooting 5-of-17 from the field while grabbing seven rebounds and adding three assists and four steals. Jay Mohr had 17 points to go with seven rebounds and two assists. Westfield was led by Austin Brengle’s 15 points and Jordan Meinen’s 12, but had few answers against Highland’s pressure defense. Defensively, we got after it,” Highland coach Phil Spoljaric remarked. “We forced them into 18 turnovers.” Ahead 33-30 at halftime, the Scots pulled away with a 16-point third quarter while winning on the glass 38-32. Jake Millikan logged a team-high four assists. Fulton led the Scots with eight rebounds. Highland next travels to Muncie South on Friday night for the first of a double-header weekend. The Scots follow the battle between Olympic Athletic Conference rivals with a trip to New Castle on Saturday. Both games are scheduled for an 8 p.m. tip.
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Sunday, November 25
There were plenty of whistles heard inside the Yorktown gymnasium Wednesday night, and it wasn’t because Highland’s boys basketball season-opener against the Tigers was a thing of beauty. In a game in which 43 personal fouls were called by a three-man officiating crew, Yorktown benefited most, cashing in with 29-of-40 free throw shooting for a 75-68 victory. Coming up short in its season-opener for a third consecutive year, Highland received strong performances from junior swingman Jay Mohr and senior guard Tyson McKinney, who tallied 24 and 22 points, respectively. Six-five frontliner Grant Fulton came through with 13 points and six rebounds for the Scots, who are at Westfield on Saturday. It wasn’t enough. After jumping out to a 17-5 lead at 2:34 of the opening quarter, Highland seemed on the verge of putting the Tigers away early. However, the second stanza proved disastrous, with the Scots outscored 22-9. By halftime, Yorktown had already converted 13 of 17 charities and Highland had made good on only 11 of 31 field goal tries (.355). “The difference was we allowed them to get to the free-throw line 40 times,” said fourth-year Scots coach Phil Spoljaric, whose club was assessed 28 fouls compared to 15 for the hosts. “And I will say that our shot selection was poor in crucial times. Against good defensive teams, you have to take good shots. We could have shared the ball better and made them work harder on defense.” Yorktown knows “D,” having last season limited the opposition to an average of 38.8 points, fifth-best in the state. The Tigers on Wednesday kept Highland cool from the floor. The Scots made 25 of 63 field goal attempts (.397). In the second half, Highland continued to chip away at the 10-point halftime deficit, getting to within three (48-45) late in the third and twice within a single point in the fourth quarter. After the 6-foot Mohr snaked inside for a lay-up at 3:20 to trim Yorktown’s advantage to 64-63, the Tigers rattled off eight consecutive points — six coming from the free-throw stripe — to finally put the Scots away. “Foul trouble really dictated that first half, but I was happy with the way we came back in the second half,” said Spoljaric. “We jumped on them early and played with a lot of intensity in that first quarter, but foul trouble took the wind out of our sail.” Emerson Kampen, a 6-foot-10 senior post, led Yorktown with 26 points, 13 boards and numerous shot alterations at the defensive end. Kampen’s younger brother, Elliott, a smooth left-handed 6-foot-3 sophomore forward, added 15 points, while 6-foot-5 senior Brennan Brown came off the bench to score 15. In the junior varsity contest, Highland won 42-20. Leading the Scots were 5-foot-8 sophomore guard Blaine Crouse with 13 points and 6-foot soph Derrick Hill’s 12.
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Saturday, December 1
Muncie Southside left the door cracked for a potential Highland comeback on Friday night, but a nasty habit resurfaced, hurting the Scots’ chances once again. Plagued by poor shot selection for a second time on the young season, Highland trailed by as many as 13 points in the first half, but rallied behind a strong defensive effort to cut the lead to one. However, a stout zone defense by the Class 3A Rebels the final 16 minutes, and several forced shots by Class 4A Highland, slammed the door on a potential Olympic Athletic Conference win — while fueling a disturbing trend in the Scots' 57-49 loss to the Rebels. “That is Highland basketball in a nutshell right there,” Scots head coach Phil Spoljaric remarked on his team’s 19 of 53 shooting night. “We would be 3-0 if we had better shot selection. “We have to improve on our shot selection, and I think there are several people on this team that understand that.” The Scots fell behind in a hurry as Muncie South scored 27 points in the first behind a 73 percent shooting quarter. Standout senior guard Wenstone Nash led the early onslaught, going 5 for 5 from the field before finishing with a team-high 17 points. In the second quarter, the Rebels’ offense ran dry, netting five points before the break and another eight in the third. Meanwhile, the Scots clawed back to cut the lead to three and later one point in the fourth as the duo of Tyson McKinney and Jay Mohr supplied nearly 90 percent of the offense. The Scots scored 21 points over the second and third quarters. McKinney finished with 18 points, six rebounds, two assists and three steals. Mohr, who electrified the crowd with a reverse dunk off a McKinney pass in the third quarter, netted a game-high 20 points. The “driver” shot 7 of 12 from the field and added eight rebounds. The Rebels (2-0), while reliant on the production of their guard tandem of Nash and D.J. Buchanan (14 points), also found support from center Jeff Bell. The 6-foot, 5-inch senior logged 12 points and hauled in 19 rebounds — with 12 on the defensive end. Down 43-42 with 5:58 remaining, Highland went nearly five minutes without a score while Muncie South stretched the lead to nine. The Rebels shot 50 percent from the floor in the final eight minutes despite only converting on 30 percent of their long-range shots. The Scots finished the night 35 percent from the field and broke 40 percent once — in the fourth quarter. “That (first) quarter killed us period. We showed we can defend. In the second quarter and third quarter, we held them to 13 points combined,” Spoljaric said. “I thought the defensive effort was there. If you would of told me, we would beat them on the boards 29 to 39, and they shoot from three 6 of 20, I would have told you we won. But it didn’t happen that way because of our shot selection.”
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