Cougars fall in third-place matchup

Friday, December 30, 2016
Brown County’s Eli Patterson (left) breaks down the floor Friday with North Putnam’s Preston Porter pressing closely. The Cougars went on to lose the third-place matchup against Brown County in the Monrovia Holiday Classic.
Banner Graphic/JOEY BENNETT

MONROVIA – The only thing worse for North Putnam’s boys’ basketball team than playing against a 6-foot-10 opponent is having less than a day to prepare for the challenge.

The Cougars met Brown County on Friday evening in the third-place game of the Monrovia Holiday Classic, and Eagle big man Josh Cochran proved to be a big problem on both ends of the court.

Offensively, Cochran demonstrated a soft touch around the basket and scored 18 points while also grabbing 14 rebounds; on defense, he was effective in neutralizing the North Putnam inside game that is dependent on much smaller personnel.

“With how we play, and our size, 6-10 is a game-changer on both ends,” Cougar coach Collin McCartt said. “You would think when a guy is 6-10 that he’s a shot blocker, but he did a good job of staying straight up. We could have attacked a little more to see what we could have done.”

North Putnam’s Elliot Gross and Luke Mitchel, both standing 6-2, took turns battling the Eagle behemoth underneath.

“They both did a good job against him, but there’s only so much you can do,” McCartt said. “It was a struggle to figure out what to do with him all night.”

Forced to shoot mostly from the outside, the Cougars hit four 3-pointers in the opening period to take a 17-10 lead before Cochran got a pair of baskets and Hunter First added a trey to create a 17-17 tie after one period.

Brown County rode two more Cochran baskets and five points from Isaiah Kefauver to take a 28-23 lead with 2:33 left in the half, but the Cougars got a pair of free throws from both Treyton Smith and Preston Porter to close the gap to 28-27 at intermission.

A Porter trey early in the third quarter gave North Putnam its last lead at 32-31, but the Eagles got scoring from four different players to control the rest of the period and take a 47-40 lead into the final quarter.

“We had a few defensive laps there in the third quarter, and we had some good looks that didn’t go,” McCartt said. “That led to a little bit of frustration, and we have to get better as far as bringing themselves out of it if we make a mistake.”

The Cougars trailed 53-44 midway through the final period before senior Duke Duff got going, hitting a trey, followed by a free throw and then a basket plus a free throw as the Cougars cut the gap to 55-51 with 2:14 left.

Using a pressing defense and a halfcourt trap, the Cougars were able to force Brown County into nine turnovers in the period – creating fast break opportunities that did not require getting past Cochran to the hoop.

Brown County missed a one-and-one opportunity with 51.1 seconds left, and Gross hit a free throw with 30 seconds left to cut the gap to 55-52.

The Cougars missed a 3-pointer with 10.1 seconds left, fouled, saw Brown County miss the free throw opportunity and missed another trey with two seconds left to see victory fall just out of their reach.

“In the fourth quarter, we have to be able to find the same type of energy in our halfcourt defense than we get when we go full court,” McCartt said. “Our guys did a great job to get us back in it at the end. We had two good shots to tie it at the end.

“We obviously didn’t shoot well.”

Gross led North Putnam with 17, while Porter added 11. The Cougars hit just 16 of 44 shots on the night, including only 7 of 27 from long range.

Despite winning only one of three games in the tourney, McCartt thought it was a beneficial experience.

“We got a lot out of it,” McCartt said. “It was very tough to prepare for Southwestern, the way they run their offense, and for Brown County’s size with very little time.

“We feel like we’ve let some games get away from us when we thought we were the better team, and we had two of those in this tourney.”

BROWN COUNTY (55) – Norman 4-9 0-0 8, Scully 2-4 2-4 8, Keefauver 5-7 2-2 13, First 3-6 0-0 8, Cochran 8-12 2-2 18, Patterson 0-1 0-0 0, Hemingway 0 0-0 0. Totals 22-39 FG, 6-8 FT, 55 TP

NORTH PUTNAM (52) – Gross 7-11 3-4 17, Porter 3-14 2-4 11, Smith 2-4 2-2 7, Duff 2-8 2-3 7, Judy 2-5 2-2 8, Webster 0-3 2-2 2, Mitchel 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 16-44 FG, 13-17 FT, 52 TP

Brown County 17 11 19 8 – 55

North Putnam 17 10 13 12 – 52

3-point shooting – BC 5-10 (Norman 0-3, Scully 2-2, Kefauver 1-1, First 2-4), NP 7-27 (Porter 3-13, Smith 1-2, Duff 1-5, Judy 2-4, Webster 0-3). Turnovers – BC 15, NP 9. Rebounds – BC 31 (Cochran 14), NP 18 (Gross 8).

Next game – North Putnam (3-6) plays at West Vigo on Friday and hosts North Vermillion on Saturday.

Respond to this story

Posting a comment requires free registration: