By RICK SPRUNGER
PERU — A hot-shooting band of Peru Tigers brought Norwell’s season to a disappointing and premature close Saturday night.
Firing away at a blazing .590 clip (23-for-39), the Tigers defeated the Knights, 78-68, in the Class 3A Peru sectional championship game.
Peru, now 17-7 on the season and conquerors of No. 5 Oak Hill and No. 3 Norwell on consecutive nights, will move on to face Delta (17-9) in this week’s New Castle regional.
Norwell brought the curtain down on a 22-4 campaign.
Peru set the tone Saturday night in the first quarter, connecting on 10 of 12 field goals, including a perfect 6-for-6 from behind the arc, and bolting to a 28-15 lead at the close of the period.
From the 1:50 mark of the first quarter until 5:50 of the second, a run of 15 Tiger points was interrupted only by a three-pointer by Lleyton Bailey to start the second period and handed the host school control of the game at 35-18.
“Their shooting in the first quarter was incredible, phenomenal,” said Norwell coach Mike McBride after the game, searching for words to communicate what he had just witnessed. “You just don’t see something like that.”
The chief marksman in that first-quarter barrage was Matthew Roettger, a 6-3 junior, who nailed four three-pointers in the first eight minutes on his way to 21 points.
“We did a good job of fighting back to make it manageable at halftime,” continued McBride. “But if they’re not as unconscious as they were in the first quarter, we could have come back and won.”
The Knights did, indeed, fight back; but the hill proved to be too high to scale.
Jake Parker led the way.
The 6-3 senior scored 16 of his game-high 24 points in the first half and lit a charge in the Norwell offense midway through the second quarter.
He wrapped a three-pointer and a conventional three-point play underneath around a Peru turnover.
Then, after Luke McBride picked off a Tiger pass, Parker rebounded a McBride miss and pitched it right back out to him.
McBride didn’t miss a second time, and his three-pointer from the top of the key narrowed the Peru lead to 35-27, detonated a roar from the Norwell faithful, and drove Peru to a timeout at the 4:56 mark of the period.
“We wanted to be within single digits by halftime and within six points at the end of the third quarter,” said the elder McBride later.
Neither worked out.
Norwell was within one stop of achieving the first of those goals, trailing 41-33 in the waning moments of the first half.
But Peru’s Gavin Eldridge drove the lane and converted a three-point play with 0:04 left, and the lead was back up to 44-33.
Norwell came out firing in the second half, however.
McBride and Parker started the third quarter with consecutive three-pointers, and McBride followed a wild Peru pass that sailed out of bounds with a drive through the lane.
Cohen Bailey picked off another errant Tiger pass, and Brody Bolyn hit the first of two free throws for a 44-42 score.
Bolyn missed his second free toss, but McBride got the rebound and was hammered by Alex Ross on his way back up.
McBride swished one of two to inch the Knights to within 44-43.
But Peru steadied.
Roettger’s rebound basket, a three-pointer, and another three by Ross, along with three Norwell misses from behind the arc, widened it back out to 51-43.
Still, a steal and layup by Parker with 0:12 left in the quarter got it back to 51-45, right where McBride wanted it at the quarter’s end.
And then?
“We had a really tough call go against us at the end of the third quarter,” recounted McBride, choosing his words carefully. “It was a block/charge, and we thought Jake was set. But they got the block, and then they inbounded and got a three-point play underneath at the buzzer. That was just so pivotal. We got a three-point play (by Cohen Bailey) to start the fourth quarter, but we were still down six instead of only three.”
Norwell did get it down to three.
Twice.
The first time was on a three-pointer by Gavin Hoeppner that made it 56-53 with 5:16 remaining; the second was on two McBride free throws for a 63-60 score at 2:41.
“We had opportunities, but we couldn’t get a stop, and they hit their free throws,” said McBride matter-of-factly. Everything that could have gone right for them went right.”
Not only did Peru shoot the lights out, but the Tigers dominated Norwell on the boards, 30-20.
“That was one of our main goals,” smiled a relieved Peru coach Eric Thompson while watching his teams cut down the nets. “We wanted to outrebound them, out-hustle them, and get every loose ball we could get. And we needed to be ice at the free throw line.”
That was the job of Eldridge.
Peru kept the ball in the hands of its 5-8 sophomore down the stretch, and he rewarded the Tigers’ trust by connecting on 13 of 14 fourth-quarter free throws to keep the Tigers just out of reach.
Norwell finished 20-for-50 from the floor for a .400 shooting percentage while turning the ball over just eight times.
Parker got his 24 points on 8-for-14 shooting that included six of eight from three-point range.
McBride added 20 and Lleyton Bailey 10.
Peru had three players combine for 64 of its 78 points, including Eldridge (23), Roettger (21), and Ross (20), the latter on 8-for-10 shooting from the field.
Although obviously disappointed, McBride had nothing but praise for his seniors, which included Jake Parker, Lleyton Bailey, Luke McBride, Brody Bolyn, Luke Graft, Gavin Hoeppner, and Jon Colbert.
“This was an incredible group of kids with some incredible accomplishments,” said their coach. “In four years, they won two sectionals and three conference championships and had three 20-win seasons. Those are amazing accomplishments.”
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PERU 78, NORWELL 68
at Peru High School
PERU (17-7): Gavin Eldridge 4-11 14-15 23, Ian Potts 2-3 3-4 8, Alex Ross 8-10 4-5 20, Matthew Roettger 7-12 2-2 21, Braxton Robbins 2-3 1-2 6, Xavier Turner 0-0 0-0 0, Reis Bellar 0-0 0-0 0, Jaxson Manriquez 0-0 0-0 0, Isaac Braley 0-0 0-0 0. TOTAL: 23-39 24-28 78.
NORWELL (22-4): Jake Parker 8-14 2-3 24, Cohen Bailey 1-7 4-7 6, Lleyton Bailey 3-9 2-2 10, Luke McBride 6-15 6-7 20, Brody Bolyn 1-2 1-2 3, Luke Graft 0-1 0-0 0, Ashton Federspiel 0-0 0-0 0, Gavin Hoeppner 1-2 2-2 5, Adam McBride 0-0 0-0 0, Owen Wallis 0-0 0-0 0, Brady Smith 0-0 0-0 0, Kaedyn Quintanilla 0-1 0-0 0. TOTAL: 20-5- 17-23 68.
Peru 28 16 10 24 — 78
Norwell 15 18 12 23 — 68
Three-point shooting: Peru 8-15 (Eldridge 1-3, Potts 1-2, Ross 0-1, Roettger 5-7, Robbins 1-2), Norwell 11-26 (Parker 6-8, C. Bailey 0-2, L. Bailey 2-8, L. McBride 2-5, Hoeppner 1-2). Rebounds: Peru 30 (Roettger 10, Ross 9, Eldridge 5), Norwell 20 (L. McBride 6). Turnovers: Peru 14, Norwell 8. Personal fouls: Peru 21, Norwell 23. Fouled Out: Parker, L. Bailey. Technical fouls: None.
