For the Daily Journal
MARTINSVILLE
The Indian Creek boys played hard but eventually fell at Martinsville on Tuesday night, 60-49.
The Artesians got off to a hot start thanks to the accurate shooting of Tyler Stead. The 6-foot-6 senior led the way for the Artesians by going a perfect 4-4 from the field. That spurt included a transition 3-pointer, his second of the game, that gave Martinsville an 18-11 lead at the end of the first quarter.
Stead cooled slightly from there but managed to finish the game with 16 points.
Indian Creek turned up the defense to start the second, holding Martinsville scoreless for the first few minutes of the quarter. Braves senior guard Cooper Britt managed to pile up a couple of steals to leading his team on a small run.
Senior Jace Russell was on the receiving end taking a layup coast to coast to cut the Martinsville lead to 27-24. Russell finished as Indian Creek’s leading scorer on the night with 14 points, while Britt added 13.
The fundamentals that got the Braves (5-3) within one possession at halftime seemed to have stayed in the locker room to start the third quarter. Indian Creek opened up the half with three open shots but failed to connect on any of them. The defense was tight but the ball was refusing to bounce in the right way offensively.
“We played hard,” Braves coach Drew Glentzer said. “There were times we just didn’t play that smart. When your shots aren’t falling its hard to stay motivated defensively.”
Despite solid showings in the second and fourth quarters the Braves’ defense had big lapses. One of those led to an 11-2 run by Martinsville midway through the third quarter that brought the lead to 38-26. The Braves couldn’t get much closer the rest of the night.
“We had good spurts defensively; unfortunately we had some bad spurts,” Glentzer said.
Martinsville guard Reid Staggs had a tremendous second half, scoring all but two of his 23 points after the intermission.
Indian Creek is back home against Greenfield-Central on Friday.
