BENNETT'S MINUTES: No letup in hectic whirlwind

Tuesday, October 10, 2017
The new FieldTurf artificial surface at Southmont High School did an amazing job of draining the heavy rainfall on Saturday night to allow the girls’ soccer sectional championship to take place.
Banner Graphic/JOEY BENNETT

Full weekend of activity never took breather

A promoted ad popped up on my Facebook timeline today offering T-shirts with the slogan something to the effect that “I’m a sports editor so you know I don’t have any sanity.”

If you read Tuesday’s Banner Graphic, you would know that I don’t need to purchase that item for my sanity to be questioned after the crazy and busy weekend.

Friday was a normal night, covering a football game, leaving the office about 1:15 and getting home about 2 a.m.

I left home about 9:30 a.m. after a few hours of sleep for South Putnam and the cross country sectional, and another chance to be amazed at the dedication and physical self-abuse the runners put themselves through. On purpose. I was a marginal-at-best athlete in baseball, basketball and softball – but I was always mysteriously busy on the day of cross country tryouts.

Watching Greencastle’s Emma Wilson run with her machine-like efficiency is an underrated experience. Many of the other runners look pained and in extreme discomfort during the races, and some vomit soon after crossing the finish line.

Wilson just motors along, occasionally looking at her watch to check her time, and rarely looking back at the competition – which becomes harder to do as the race progresses.

The races ended about 11:45, and thanks to the wonders of the results being posted on the Internet I was able to progress to stop No. 2 – the boys’ soccer sectional at Sullivan.

For Greencastle’s sixth-ranked team to eventually win the title was not surprising. This team is really good.

There was a little subplot to the day, with West Vigo coach Culley DeGroote having taught the senior members of the Tiger Cub squad in sixth grade six years ago when he was a physical education teacher at GMS.

He sometimes kidded the Cub players and referred to their past relationship.

Another item of interest was the presence of Greencastle girls’ coach Angie Weeks, whose son Leo was trying to attempt to win his second sectional title in the last three years.

The presence of a parent at a big game is not interesting, except that Angie needed to be at Southmont to coach the Tiger Cub team (for which her sophomore daughter Catherine also plays). There was enough time to navigate the 86-mile trip to New Market for the girls’ match, but not an excessive amount.

Greencastle athletic director Doug Greenlee was probably the only person on the planet to need to complete the sectional trifecta and depart Sullivan for Southmont. He stopped off at home in Greencastle to change clothes and have dinner, and I just opted to stop and eat in Terre Haute and head on north.

I was monitoring the weather, and a huge band of storms extended for a few hundred miles with Southmont seemingly the midpoint of the storm. More rain was coming behind it.

I headed on to Southmont, thinking they might start early to avoid and not wanting to miss any action. As it turns out, the storm was moving fast so they wisely chose to delay the start of the match. Everyone was asked to leave the stadium, so I retired to my truck for a 90-minute wait until the coast was clear.

I knew that Southmont had recently installed a FieldTurf artificial surface, and was curious to see how it would deal with the large amount of rainfall.

As it turns out, the field was great. There was no evidence of players slipping or losing their footing, and the weather had no impact on the play.

I am never sure that a $1 million investment of this nature is wise in the tough economic environment of public education, but it sure saved this event. People I talked to at the match said the previous field would have been “totally underwater” and there was no way they could have played.

The players seemed unaffected by the delay, and the match was non-stop action. It would be interesting to determine who was more tired, a cross country runner after going 5,000 meters or a soccer player running all over the place for 80 minutes. It’s safe to say that both would be exhausted.

Fortunately, the drive home was uneventful and – 14 hours after it started – this long, crazy but fun day was finally complete. Three different schools in three different counties, and 199 miles between them.

Was the hectic weekend over? Of course not.

I woke up not nearly enough hours into Sunday morning by my phone exploding (metaphorically, fortunately, and not literally) with the news that Cooper Neese was leaving Butler. (We’ll get to that in a minute.)

So that obviously big story was added to the mix, complete with the temporary uncertainty over his next move. Fortunately, that question was resolved just in time on Monday night in order to be added to the huge sports section.

Insane? Probably. Fun and memorable? Definitely.

At least I get a midweek break for a couple of days, before volleyball sectional action at Monrovia on Thursday night, football at Brown County on Friday night and hopefully two regional soccer matches at Heritage Hills on Saturday. Yes, I get paid mileage, and yes, I am staying overnight in Columbus.

I definitely need to find the website for one of those T-shirts, though.

Cooper is a Sycamore

I could not be happier for Neese to have chosen Indiana State as his new collegiate home, having graduated from the school twice and been a fan back before the construction of Hulman Center in 1974.

According to the NCAA, for Neese (or any men’s basketball player) to transfer is not unexpected.

“About 40 % of all men’s basketball players who enter Division I directly out of high school depart their initial school by the end of their sophomore year,” the NCAA found in a report tracking transfers issued earlier this year.

We have all been in situations that we didn’t feel comfortable or find a “fit,” and moved on to better possibilities.

The coaching change at Butler couldn’t have helped. As legendary NFL coach Bill Parcells famously said, “If I’m going to cook the meal I want to buy the groceries.” Sometimes, new coaches and players they didn’t recruit don’t mesh.

As chronicled this summer, Neese didn’t get the opportunity on the Indiana All-Star team that it seemed he should have as one of the top 10 scorers in state history.

Indiana State conveniently had a scholarship open just before the start of school this fall when a player originally from Texas transferred to a school closer to home.

Neese’s departure came soon afterward, and a marriage was formed that maybe should have happened earlier. I still believe Neese could have succeeded at the Big East level, but there were no guarantees.

I know he will thrive at ISU, and Sycamore coach Greg Lansing is thrilled to have him.

“I couldn’t be more excited about getting him here on campus,” Lansing told the Terre Haute Tribune-Star. “We recruited him hard out of high school, but understood when Butler offered. When that happens you wish them well, but things like this sometimes happen. We’re fortunate to get an Indiana All-Star and a local kid.”

Lansing said he watched Neese’s evolution as a player.

“I think seeing him earlier in his career, people considered him mostly as a shooter. I saw him a lot in July [2016] after he committed to Butler and I was so impressed with how well he completed himself as a player. He was putting it on the ground and played defense. Not only that, but to be able to score that many points with defenses designed to stop him says a lot about him as a player.”

The story in the print edition of Tuesday’s Banner Graphic contained one minor error, resulting from still-conflicting information on the rare timing of the move.

Neese will have to sit out until mid-December of 2018, and some media reports indicate he will have four years of eligibility. It seems in past cases that players who transfer at a time similar to Neese normally finish out the first year, then play three more.

However it plays out, it will be great to see Neese in blue and white when he gets to take the court.

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  • Curious why you are going to the 11th place game when two county teams are playing each other in the 5th place game?

    -- Posted by Javabeans on Wed, Oct 11, 2017, at 6:58 AM
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