Tigers win tournament despite loss to Bulldogs

WILLARD, Mo. -- Fort Scott High's boys lost the battle but won the war here Saturday night.

Even though the Tigers lost to Greenwood, Ark., 54-45, on the final night of the round-robin Willard Tri-State Classic, the tournament ended with three teams with 2-1 records.

This forced the tournament's tie-breaker to come into effect, which the Tigers won on the basis of winning the point-margin tie-breaker. Had Shiloh Christian defeated Willard Saturday night instead, it would have been a two-way tie-breaker between Fort Scott and Greenwood, which the Bulldogs would have won on head-to-head play.

Fort Scott had the best margin in their three games, which won the first step of the tie breaker. The second step then fell to the head-to-head result of Friday's Willard-Greenwood game, which was won by the host team. So even though the Bulldogs won Saturday night, they actually ended up in third place.

And the Bulldogs won that game with their second-half defense, holding Fort Scott to seven-of-30 shooting from the field in the final 16 minutes of play. Greenwood wasn't exactly on fire itself, making only six of 15 shots in the second half, but they made their free throws when it counted.

When the Tigers had to foul in order to save time late in the game, the Bulldogs converted nine of 10 free throws in the final 1:11 of play.

The game started out with the teams swapping scores. Alex Barner scored eight of the first 10 points for the Tigers, the last two forging a 10-10 tie halfway through the first quarter.

But Barner also got saddled with his second foul and had to go to the bench. He couldn't regain that touch, having to play carefully in the second quarter to avoid a third foul, and finished with 12 points, though that still led the team.

"That was tough," Fort Scott head coach Jeff DeLaTorre said. "(Alex) started out really doing a great job on us. When things like (foul problems) happen, we have to have people step up. We got a lot of effort from a lot of people. But their defense picked up and we hit a little lag. And it's tough when you get in foul trouble to get back into that rhythm late in the game."

Jeff Johnson and Tony Karleskint kept the Tigers in the game although Chris Gregory's three-point basket with a minute to go gave the Bulldogs an 18-16 lead going into the second period.

Johnson, then Drew Messer scored baskets to start the second quarter. And Matt Wheeler's three-point shot off a Jake Clements steal made it a 23-22 lead with 3:43 to go in the half.

But Greenwood started forcing turnovers and scoring off them. They took a 29-25 lead with two minutes to go, then forced turnovers on three consecutive Tiger possessions as time wound down.

Fort Scott turned the ball over seven times in the second quarter alone. More often than not under DeLaTorre, the Tigers have single-digit turnovers over entire games, so this is a tribute to the kind of defense Greenwood played.

The Tigers never led again but got oh-so-close a couple of times. John Leek took a steal in for a layup to bring them within 31-30 with 4:37 to go in the third. Johnson stuck back a teammate's miss to cut it back down to 34-32 with 3:14 to go. But Ethan Robinson's triple made it a five-point game going into the fourth.

Early in the period, Leek drew his fourth foul and Coady Church drew a key charging call. Moments later, Karleskint and Tony Napier bumped heads trying to get a defensive rebound.

Still, Wheeler brought Fort Scott within 43-40 with four minutes to go after nailing another three-pointer. And Leek's defense forced what looked to be a key traveling call with about two minutes to go.

But the Tigers went over three minutes between scores after Wheeler's triple. The deficit was seven before Wheeler hit another three with 43 seconds to go that cut the deficit to 47-43.

"In the end, it was just that we didn't hit our shots," DeLaTorre said. "We had some looks underneath and we couldn't get some outside shots to fall. Overall, (Greenwood) just played a little bit better than we did today. But I think we can build on this and become a better team because of this."

Johnson finished with 11 points and 11 rebounds for the Tigers, both personal bests at the varsity level.

Junior Jake Hindman, a 6' 3" forward, led Greenwood with 17 points. Wald connected on 13 of 17 free-throw attempts as he finished with 15 points. Church had 10 for the Bulldogs.

Fort Scott shot 36 percent from the field for the game, making 18 of 50 field-goal attempts. Greenwood shot 44 percent on 15 of 34.

The Tigers outrebounded the Bulldogs, 31-26, but also committed 16 turnovers to Greenwood's 14.

"It was just one of those days where things didn't go our way from the beginning," DeLaTorre said. "We kind of got off to a decent start but you gotta hand it to Greenwood; they played really well. The presented some problems for us with their quickness. They were the type of team that we thought might give us some problems. We saw some things that we can work on but I'm proud of how we fought and battled but this just wasn't our day.

"It wasn't our best game…but better to have that on December 1st than in March."

Fort Scott opens Southeast Kansas League play at Pittsburg Tuesday night.

ALL-TOURNAMENT TEAM -- Barner and Karleskint earned honors for Fort Scott. Barner scored 50 points in the three games here while Karleskint scored 26.

Also named were Greenwood's Wald and Hindman, Shiloh Christian's Joel Lookadoo and Willard's Kevin Bracamonte and Ronnie Rust.

Greenwood's Adam Reames was also announced but he didn't play in the tournament as he was with the football team, which was still playing in Arkansas' Class 5A playoffs. The error wasn't straightened out before the presentations at the end of the game concluded, but we'd guess that it was either Church or Devin Jones who was supposed to be honored. Jones started Saturday's game but was injured early in the second quarter while going for a rebound and never returned.

Willard won the Dave Regan Memorial Sportsmanship Award. The award was named in honor of the Fort Scott teacher and coach after his untimely death in 2003.

GREENWOOD, Ark.: Napier 1-5 1-3 4, McDonald 0-0 0-0 0, Wald 1-6 13-17 15, Gregory 1-3 0-0 3, Ethan Robinson 1-2 0-0 3, Hocott 0-0 2-2 2, Hindman 6-10 4-6 17, Church 5-8 0-0 10, Jones 0-0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 15-34 20-28 54.

FORT SCOTT: Leek 1-6 0-0 2, Clements 0-0 2-2 2, T.Karleskint 3-10 0-0 6, Wheeler 3-14 0-0 9, Messer 1-3 1-2 3, Johnson 4-7 3-4 11, Allen 0-2 0-0 0, Barner 6-8 0-1 12. TOTALS: 18-50 6-9 45.

Greenwood, Ark............... 18 11 8 17 -- 54

Fort Scott................... 16 9 7 13 -- 45

Three-point field goals: Greenwood 4-11 (Napier 1-2, Gregory 1-2, Robinson 1-2, Hindman 1-3, Wald 0-2), Fort Scott 3-17 (Wheeler 3-11, T.Karleskint 0-1, Messer 0-1, Leek 0-4).

Total fouls: Greenwood 11, Fort Scott 21. Fouled out: Church.

Rebounds: Greenwood 26 (Hindman 5, Church 5), Fort Scott 31 (Johnson 11). Assists: Greenwood 4 (four with 1 each), Fort Scott 6 (Leek 2, Clements 2). Turnovers: Greenwood 14, Fort Scott 16. Steals: Greenwood 8 (Wald 4), Fort Scott 7 (Wheeler 3). Blocked shots: Greenwood 1 (Church), Fort Scott none.