Norwell bounced back to beat Triton Central after a loss to Decatur Central
By RYAN WALKER
Game 1
NEW CASTLE — The Norwell boys couldn’t carry its first half efforts into the second half in a 57-45 loss in Game 1 of the New Castle Holiday Tournament early Wednesday afternoon.
The Knights (5-3) held a 20-15 lead at the break over Decatur Central (5-2) before KC Berry and Melakih Cunningham willed the Hawks to a 12-point victory.
The two combined for 40 points, led by Berry’s 22 points and six triples. Cunningham went 7-12 from the floor to go with his 18 points and four.
The three-point buckets made by Berry, who is shooting just 27 percent on the year, forced Norwell head coach Mike McBride to switch to a zone and try to extend his defense outside.
“Well, Berry was only shooting 27 percent from three coming in, so he had a really good shooting game and that was a big difference in the game,” McBride said. “We weren’t anticipating that.”
“Cunningham, we knew he was a challenge,” he continued. “He’s been their leading scorer and he’s really good around the basket. We knew he would present those challenges. I thought we did a decent job on his for most of the game, at least the first half. The second half he was a little more active.”
Decatur Central didn’t have that far of a lead over Norwell until late in the fourth quarter. The Knights were on top of or even with the Hawks for most of the contest.
The 20-15 lead in the first half was mostly due to their defense.
After a cold shooting performance from both groups in the first half, Norwell began to establish its inside game with Ashton Federspiel and Cade Shelton.
Federspiel and Shelton put up 18 of the team’s points from underneath the basket and got to the free-throw line. Federspiel led the team with 12 points.
“We were really trying to get that and establish that, and they did a good job,” McBride said. “We wanted to try to get Cade to that eight to 12-point range today. Ashton did a good job there once we got it going. Those are two guys we’re trying to play inside out. We were trying to play through Ashton and Cade down low and trying to get Cohen (Bailey) down low on some penetration.”
Other than Adam McBride and Owen Wallis’ three, the Knights didn’t have much going from mid-range and beyond in the first half and in the third quarter. The two triples were the only ones hit until three more came in the fourth quarter, but the Knights were already down by nearly double digits by that time.
Last year, Norwell went 2-1 in a similar tournament during the Noblesville Holiday Tournament. The Knights fell to Columbus North, but defeated a good Chesterton and Castle teams, all of which were close in score.
Regardless of the outcomes of these non-conference games, the goal for McBride and other schools is to face adversity through many different styles of play at this time of year. And despite the loss, the team was in the game with another solid basketball program in Decatur Central and learned a lot.
“I think Decatur Central deserves a lot of credit. I thought we battled really hard and competed really well. I think that was a good game for us to play today to help prepare us for some of the things we’ll see in January,” McBride said.
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DECATUR CENTRAL 57, NORWELL 45
At New Castle High School
NORWELL (5-3): Ashton Federspiel 3-9 8-8 15, Adam McBride 4-8 0-0 10, Cade Shelton 3-5 2-2 8, Cohen Bailey 2-10 909 5, Brady Smith 2-3 0-0 4, Owen Wallis 1-1 0-0 3, Kaedyn Quintanilla 0-0 0-0 0, Nick MBride 0-2 0-0 0. TOTALS: 15-40 10-10 45.
DECATUR CENTRAL (5-2): KC Berry 8-16 0-0 22, Melakih Cunningham7-12 3-4 18, Eric Hopson 2-3 1-2 6, Ayden Lawson 1-2 2-2 4, Ty’reese Burnett 0-2 3-4 3, Nash Sigmund 1-7 0-0 2, Antawn Price 1-1 0-0 2. TOTALS: 20-43 9-12 57.
Norwell 8 12 12 13 –– 45
Decatur C. 8 7 20 22 –– 57
Three-point FG: Norwell: 5-14 (A. McBride 2-5, Wallis 1-1, Bailey 1-3, Federspiel 1-2, Quintanilla 0-1, N. McBride 0-2), Decatur Central: 8-24 (Berry 6-11, Cunningham 1-5, Hopson 1-2, Sigmund 0-6). Rebounds: Norwell: 20 (Shelton 5, Bailey 4, Smith 4, A. McBride 3, Federspiel 2, Wallis 1), Decatur Central: 28 (Burnett 8, Lawson 7, TEAM 3, Price 3, Berry 2, Hopson 1). Turnovers: Norwell: 7, Decatur Central: 8. Fouls: Norwell: 10, Decatur Central: 10. Fouled Out: None. Technicals: None.
By RYAN WALKER
Game 2
NEW CASTLE — With a 57-45 victory over Triton Central, the Norwell boys officially placed third overall at the New Castle Holiday Tournament.
McBride’s emphasis in Game 1 on 2-point shooting percentage, which was just 39 percent against Decatur Central, jumped to 56 percent and helped keep the Tigers (7-3) from crawling back.
“We didn’t force it. We didn’t force anything,” McBride said after the second game. “In the first game, we missed some easy ones right before the half. We had a layup we blew. This game, we didn’t blow our layup opportunities and when we didn’t have (a good look) we passed the ball back out. In the first half, a couple of times we tried to force it over guys. This time we didn’t push it over guys. We passed it back out and we let the ball move until we got that shot.”
Adam McBride and Ashton Federspiel had nine of the 17 shots from inside the arc and both led the way with 14 and 13 points.
It didn’t necesarily click right away, as Triton Central took a 9-5 lead at the end of the first quarter, but a quick pair of turnovers were capitalized by Owen Wallis to get the Knights (6-3) right back on track.
Norwell ended up winning that second quarter 16-7 with just two three-point attempts and holding the Tigers to 2-7 from the floor. The lone three-pointer made was McBride nailing it with two seconds remaining before the buzzer and gave his squad the lead and much-needed momentum for the second half.
“A big, big boost for us at the end of the half was Adam hitting a three,” Mike McBride said. “We go in instead of up two, we go in up five. I thought that was a big play for us.”
The shot gave the Knights a 5-point lead at the break and gave enough separation to draw only two more points more in the final two quarters.
Along with Norwell’s recovery from a 2-10 showing in the first quarter to 18-27 in the rest of the game, the defense clamped down a normally high-scoring offense.
In 10 games, the Tigers have produced 54 points per contest and 49 percent from the field. Norwell got them down 14 points less than the average and eight percent off their mark.
Outside of leading scorer Eli Sego’s 15 points and big man Silar Blair’s 11, Triton Central struggled to find anything offensively. The rest of the group made five total shots at 31 percent.
The 15 points from Sego also could have been much worse, as he had 19 in the loss to New Castle hours before.
McBride praised the efforts off the bench from his junior guard in containing him.
“I thought Kaedyn Quintanilla did a good job and gave us a good spark off the bench,” McBride said. “He defensively he really made Sego work. I thought he did a nice job defensively for us — I thought he was. a big key in the game.”
In the championship game, Decatur Central topped the host school New Castle 64-60.
Norwell’s next game will be at Adams Central on Saturday, Dec. 30.
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NORWELL 47, TRITON CENTRAL 40
At New Castle High School
NORWELL (6-3): Adam McBride 6-9 0-0 14, Ashton Federspiel 5-11 3-3 13, Cohen Bailey 2-4 0-0 5, Cade Shelton 2-6 1-3 5, KAedyn Quintanilla 2-3 0-0 4, Owen Wallis 2-2 0-0 4, Brady Smith 1-1 0-1 2, Trace Moser 0-1 0-0 0, Nick McBride 0-0 0-0 0, Ryne Thornton 0-0 0-0 0, Caiden Petrie 0-0 0-0 0, Bary Riley 0-0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 20-37 4-7 47.
TRITON CENTRAL (7-3): Eli Sego 6-12 1-1 15, Silar Blair 5-11 0-0 11, Max Crouse 2-4 0-0 5, Gavin Morgan 2-3 0-0 5, Sam Collier 1-4 2-2 4, Henry Kemper 0-0 0-0 0, Taggart Goul 0-2 0-0 0, Sam Kemper 0-0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 16-39 3-3 40.
Norwell 5 16 17 9 –– 47
Tri Central 9 7 15 9 –– 40
Three-point FG: Norwell: 3-7 (A. McBride 2-4, Bailey 1-2, Federspiel 0-1), Triton Central: 5-11 (Sego 2-5, Blair 1-3, Crouse 1-2, Morgan 1-1). Rebounds: Norwell: 23 (Federspiel 8, Smith 3, Bailey 3, Moser 2, Shelton 2, Quintanilla 1), Triton Central: 17 (Sego 4, Goul 3, TEAM 3, Collier 3, S. Kemper 1, Blair 1, Morgan 1, Crouse 1). Turnovers: Norwell: 9, Triton Central: 9. Fouls: Norwell: 6,Triton Central: 7. Fouled Out: None. Technicals: None.
