Neese, Hoosiers finish four seconds from tourney title

Tuesday, July 19, 2016

ATLANTA -- Imagine the worst way to lose a basketball tournament.

Sorry, Cooper Neese and the Indy Hoosiers can top your story -- no matter what it is.

The Cloverdale senior and his summer travel squad lost 78-76 to We R1 in the Under Armour Nationals last week in three overtimes, with the game decided on sudden death (first team to score) in the third extra period.

Cloverdale's Cooper Neese drives to the basket for the Indy Hoosiers in the Adidas Invitational at Indianapolis earlier this month.

To make things worse, We R1 -- a team consisting of players from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland -- moved on to eventually win the tourney championship.

The Indy Hoosiers went undefeated the remainder of the weekend in the consolation bracket, winning that title to finish in ninth place overall.

"We actually played pretty well the whole weekend other than the four seconds that the sudden death rule was applied," Neese said Tuesday. "Everyone on the team knew we should have won the whole thing. We went in there planning to win every game we played."

Nationally-ranked Indy Hoosiers standouts Kris Wilkes of North Central and Paul Scruggs of Southport, who were both offered scholarships by Connecticut this week to add to their lengthy lists of choices, were the main contributors for the Indy Hoosiers.

"They were outstanding as usual," the Butler-bound Neese said. "We even had more guys step up like Jalen Adaway [of Logansport], and even though Zach [Gunn of Hamilton Southeastern] didn't knock down very many shots, he still did the things to keep us close or win our games."

Neese averaged 14.2 points per game for the tourney, hitting 41 percent of his 3-point shots.

"I felt I played at a much higher level last weekend just by thinking the game through a little more when I'm out there and just staying confident in my scoring and play making ability," he said. "Other than the sudden death period, the team and I were happy with how we played the whole weekend."

The Indy Hoosiers will close out their summer season starting Thursday at the 2016 FAB 48 tournament in Las Vegas.

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