Triton’s boys basketball team listens while coach Jason Groves draws up a play during a game at Bremen last Thursday. The Trojans drew South Central in their opener at Sectional 51 in Culver Tuesday night. (Photo by James Costello)

CULVER — Coaches like to say that the start of the IHSAA state tournament is the start of a new season, and it’s true that some teams have been able to pull together some nice runs after lackluster regular season finishes.

After a tough, 6-14 season Triton is a team that could use a reset, and that’s just what they’re getting with the start of Class A Sectional 51 play, says head coach Jason Groves.

“Sectional time, all the records are out the window. Let’s get out there and get after it and play to the best of our ability,” said Groves.

As part of the Trojans’ trying season, the tournament site has been moved from Triton’s home in Bourbon to nearby Hoosier North Athletic Conference foe Culver Community after the Trojan Trench was seriously damaged by a burst water pipe found in an adjacent locker room back on Jan. 8. The Trojans will open play at the new site opposite South Central (Union Mills) on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m., and defending champion Oregon-Davis (10-11) waits for the winner at 6:30 p.m. Friday after drawing the lone bye at the seven-team tilt. Culver (4-18) opens the second day of quarterfinals with South Bend Career Academy (5-17) at 6:30 Wednesday, followed by a game between Elkhart Christian (15-6) and Argos (14-7).

Groves doesn’t think too much about draws since his teams aren’t really playing for second best anyway, but that being said, Triton’s draw is a pretty good one for the team. They get to start fast rather than wait around overthinking things, which may come in handy for a team that has lost five straight but had two pretty good showings to close out the regular season — a 55-47 loss against a very good John Glenn team and a down-to-the-wire, 43-41 loss at Bremen last Thursday. And the fact that the teams with the two best records in the field, Argos and Elkhart Christian, will have to battle it out in their opener doesn’t hurt the Trojans’ chances either.

“You have to probably put together two or three really good games to win sectional anyway. Considering Argos and Elkhart Christian are on the other side of the bracket — OD and South Central are both good teams but you’ve got probably the favorite, Elkhart Christian, on the other side — so that’s kind of a plus,” said Groves. “I like playing on that Tuesday night. You get in there and play right away. Sometimes that bye at this point in the year can be a long week practice-wise and just build up your nerves a little bit.”

The Trojans will need senior Ross Johnson and his 17 points per game, but they’ll also need some deeper production from their lineup, production that could come from junior guard Beau Hepler, senior forward Dylan Hensley or even sophomore forward Tyler Heckaman, who recently bumped up from the JV. Defensively, they’ll need to hold down Satellites junior Carson Husmann and senior Josh Sims to get another shot at Oregon-Davis, which topped the Trojans 42-31 in last year’s Sectional 51 finale and backed it up with a win in the 2017-18 season-opener at Triton by the very same margin Nov. 22.

The Trojans have gone 2-4 against sectional opponents already with wins over Career Academy and Culver — the latter a 38-34 reprisal Jan. 19 a week after falling by nine to the Cavaliers — and losses to the defending champion Bobcats, Argos and Elkhart Christian. But all of those losses were competitive ones, and no one in this tournament field looks like a lock to win, even presumptive favorite Elkhart Christian.

“To be honest with you, I could see any team winning this sectional. You can knock off anybody on any given night,” Groves said. “Obviously on paper you look at Elkhart Christian, you look at OD, you look at Argos — those have to be top three. But at the same time, we’ve played with those teams. We’ve played with OD. We’ve played with Argos. We’ve played with Elkhart Christian. There’s not a team we can’t beat. We’ve just got to get our confidence and realize, hey, it’s a new season. We have nothing to lose. Let’s go out there and win this thing.”

HAMILTON SECTIONAL
Six of the seven teams in the Class 1-A Hamilton Sectional were likely all thinking the same thing heading into the tournament selection show last week: Anyone but Blackhawk.

The Braves are the easy favorite with a 21-2 mark heading into the sectional, have been consistently ranked in the top five and now top the Class A poll. Luckily for Lakeland Christian Academy, the Cougars drew Smith Academy (7-15) for their opener in the late game Wednesday, after Blackhawk and Bethany Christian (3-19) fight it out in Wednesday’s early quarterfinal, scheduled for 6 p.m. Fremont (6-16) and Lakewood Park (6-18) will open the seven-team tilt at 7 p.m. Tuesday with host Hamilton (3-21) waiting in the wings Friday night.

LCA enters the tournament as winners of five straight and nine of its last 13, and the team is feeling pretty confident heading into sectional play.

“Our confidence level heading into sectional week is pretty high right now. Getting the win over Oregon-Davis was huge for us, it let us know that we could beat a team of that caliber who was good enough or better than anyone we might see in the sectional,” said coach Chris Hohm. “We feel right now we are a legit contender, with the exception of Blackhawk.”

Josh McDaniel is leading the team as the school’s all-time 3-point king, passing 1,000 career points earlier this season while scoring over 18 points per night for the Cougars, who also have the number two 3-point shooter in program history in Jake Harmon with over 50 of them this season on his way to 10 points per game. But LCA will need a third scoring option to emerge. When the team has been right, Landon Twombly has been the all-everything for the squad, offering hustle on the defensive end with a couple steals per outing along with 10 points and three assists. Elijah Raymond and Jeremy Gross give LCA inside presence — Raymond the ability to step outside and shoot on occasion — while both Noah Twombly and Braxton Keller have filled in roles nicely in the Cougar rotation.

“Landon Twombly has been our No. 3 option, but at times he hasn’t been able to create his own shot, and he wears that at times. We have been working on getting the ball around to other players like Elijah, Jeremy and Noah, so Josh and Jake don’t have to do all of the scoring for us,” explained Hohm. “Braxton Keller has even stepped up for us at times. We have the confidence enough that we can find someone to be a third option for us.”

While they didn’t draw Blackhawk in their opener, the Cougars may well find themselves playing opposite the Braves come the late semifinal Friday night in Hamilton. But LCA’s goals are more immediate as the school looks to capture its first-ever sectional win since joining the IHSAA six years ago.

“Our goal a couple years ago was just to get a win, any win. Since I’ve been here, we haven’t been within 25-30 points of that. We are trying to get the first one, and then go from there,” said Hohm.