GCA’s Noah Reed clears room for a shot during Tuesday’s county game against visiting Indian Creek.
Chris Williams | For the Daily Journal
Down two of his top three scorers, Indian Creek coach Drew Glentzer opted for the ironman approach at Greenwood Christian on Tuesday evening, hopeful that his team’s size advantage would make up for a lack of depth.
For the better part of three quarters, it worked to great effect. But the host Cougars played the long game and wore the Braves down.
Noah Reed scored 12 of his 18 points during a late 19-2 run that erased a 13-point deficit and paved the way to a 63-57 victory in the opening round of the Johnson County tournament.
Class A No. 6 GCA (9-3) advances to face Whiteland — which pulled off a second-half comeback of its own to beat Franklin — in a 6 p.m. semifinal at Center Grove on Friday.
“We just felt that we were in good shape there at the end of the game, and we had our legs about us,” Greenwood Christian coach Jackson Williams said. “We were really preaching sharing the basketball, just moving the basketball and finding the open guy and letting everybody take shots, because we felt like we were pretty fresh.”
Indian Creek (11-2), which came in having won 11 straight, built a double-digit lead shortly before halftime and still had its largest lead, 42-29, after a three-point play from Kaden Martin with 1:17 remaining in the third period. But the Cougars got 3-point shots from Ben Comerford and Max Booher in the final 40 seconds of the quarter to get it back within single digits at 44-35.
That momentum snowballed as the Braves — who didn’t bring in any substitutes until Martin fouled out with 1:07 left in the contest — started to show signs of fatigue in the fourth. Reed opened the quarter with consecutive buckets on drives and then fed Booher for a layup that cut it to 44-41. Then, after a big offensive rebound by Alieu Ceesay kept the next GCA possession alive, Booher drilled a 3 from the left wing to tie the game back up.
Reed then added two more baskets to put the Cougars in front for good midway through the final period.
The Braves did their best to extend the game and rally back. Adam Crouch hit a 3-pointer and then sank three free throws after being fouled on another attempt, bringing the visitors to within 57-54 with 31.7 seconds left. Booher hit two from the foul line, but Brady Connell then knocked down another trey at the other end to cut it to 59-57.
That, however, was as close as it got. Reed hit two free throws with 17.2 seconds on the clock to make it a four-point game, and after a pair of Indian Creek deep balls missed the mark, GCA’s Jordan Taulman grabbed a rebound and iced it from the line.
“We probably should have made an adjustment and played a little more zone late,” Braves coach Drew Glentzer said. “Hindsight’s 20/20 … obviously we got fatigued chasing Booher through all those screens, and the game was pretty physical.”
The GCA comeback completely flipped a game that was dominated by the Braves for the first 23 minutes.
After the Cougars took an early 8-4 lead, Indian Creek pulled ahead by scoring the next nine points on three mid-range jumpers by Bobby Emberton and a 3-pointer by Trent Volz. Emberton used his length to get loose for 10 first-quarter points.
Indian Creek continued to grow the margin in the second period. A 3 from Martin, followed by a steal that led to a Crouch layup, gave the visitors a 27-16 advantage; the cushion remained at 11 points, 31-20, heading into the intermission, and the Braves were up by at least nine until Greenwood Christian scored the first 13 of the final quarter to take over.
Booher finished with a game-high 21 points for GCA, with Taulman contributing nine. Ceesay and freshman Will Simons made big contributions off the bench in the second half, particularly in neutralizing Indian Creek’s physical advantage down low.
“Everyone did a great job of doing their role,” Reed said. “Will Simons stepped up big for us keeping their bigs off the glass and setting some great screens for us.”
The Braves, who lost Landon Sichting to a season-ending knee injury, got 17 points from Crouch, 13 from Emberton, 12 from Martin and nine from Volz; Carter Modlin had seven rebounds and six assists in defeat. Glentzer expects to at least have Landon Martin, who missed Tuesday’s game, back by the time the team plays again next Friday.
He was pleased with how his team fought under the circumstances.
“I was just super proud of them,” Glentzer said. “We had our opportunities, just like they did.”
