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Burrus gets 100th win as Lady Zs beat North White despite no FGs in 4th quarter
BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS
Sports Editor, RTC
The Rochester girls basketball team defeated Kouts 42-35 and North White 29-18 to win the Small School Classic at North White Friday. This marks Rochester’s first holiday tournament title in four years. The win was the 100th career win for coach Joel Burrus (pictured second from the right).
MONON — Rylee Clevenger hit two 3-pointers and scored 10 points, and Ella McCarter won tournament MVP honors as the Rochester girls basketball team defeated North White 29-18 in the Small School Classic championship game at North White Friday.
McCarter followed a 21-point game against Kouts earlier Friday with nine more in the championship game. She also had six rebounds.
Rochester survived despite not scoring a field goal after a Clevenger 3-pointer with 4:55 left in the third quarter that gave the Lady Zs a 25-9 lead.
North White got back within 26-18 in the fourth quarter on Autumn Reif’s air ball putback, but the Lady Vikings did not score in the final 5:07.
Rochester’s Aubrey Wilson completed the scoring by making three of four free throws in the final 2:07.
Rochester committed 12 turnovers while North White had 26 in a battle of 2-3 zone defenses.
“Great, but it’s even better to win the tournament,” McCarter said when asked about winning MVP.
The win was the 100th for coach Joel Burrus, which includes three with the Lakeland Christian boys, 12 with the Caston girls, 65 with the Trinity Greenlawn boys and 20 with the Rochester girls.
Rochester has won four of its last five, improving to 9-7 on the season and evening Burrus’ record at 20-20 in 40 games as the Lady Z coach.
This is Burrus’ 10th season as a head coach – four seasons as a girls coach and six as a boys coach. Burrus referred to himself as a coaching “lifer” and added that he does not see himself doing anything else.
He also said that former Whitko and Tippecanoe Valley boys basketball coach Bill Patrick, an Indiana Basketball Hall of Famer, said he learned something every day as a coach, and he noted that Patrick coached for nearly 50 years.
An emotional Burrus said the milestone represents the positive relationships he has made with players. As an example, he noted that 2023 grad and Kalamazoo College freshman Emma Howdeshell came back to keep the scorebook while on her Winter Break.
“All the kids that you coach, it’s all them,” Burrus said. “You do it for the kids. You do this and you love doing it because of the relationships that you build. You got Emma Howdeshell down here tonight. You just think about all the kids that you’ve coached during that time and all the people that helped you get to that. It’s really their milestone. I just got to lead them in that process, and that’s how I view it.”
McCarter described Burrus as “very fiery.”
“I’m extremely happy for him,” McCarter said. “He’s a great coach. I love him to death.”
North White, who won its first game earlier Friday in the first round over Clinton Prairie, fell to 1-14.
Reif had a more modest 10 points and eight rebounds against Rochester after scoring 28 points and grabbing 15 rebounds against Clinton Prairie. She scored all four of North White’s points in the first quarter and all four of their points in the fourth quarter.
However, this game ended a four-game streak of double-figure rebounds for Reif, a sophomore post.
“Our big thing was when she caught the ball in the block, we wanted our wing to go help and dig down,” Burrus said. “Now there were a few times they made some counters by getting the ball to the corner, and we’ve got to match that with our wing. I thought (Audrey) Bolinger did a get job of walling up, having a hand over, making it tough for her to get good position, let alone a good shot. And you’re going to deal with her more at the free throw line than you are letting her lay the ball in the hoop like Clinton Prairie did.”
Reif scored the first basket on a 12-footer 31 seconds into the game, but Clevenger answered with a 3-pointer between the left corner and left wing on the ensuing possession, and Rochester never trailed again.
The Lady Zs started the second quarter on a 9-2 run that included two McCarter free throws, a McCarter 3-pointer, a Clevenger pullup 15-footer and a Wilson driving banker.
That made it 16-6, and Rochester carried an 18-9 lead into halftime.
Two baskets from McCarter sandwiched two missed free throws from Reif to open the second half. Clevenger’s trey got the lead to 16.
Though Rochester did not get another field goal, North White only got three field goals themselves.
“They’re very active,” North White coach Bryan Heimlich said. “They’ve got some length too. That helps. It just makes it a little harder to make some of those exterior passes, one, but then interior, two. We knew we had to throw some bounce passes against them. We just need to be a little more active, probably reverse the ball a little bit more. But they’re very good and very active. That’s probably the biggest thing. They just react to every pass. They’re right there, and they don’t give you many open looks from 3. … They’re a good team, and there’s a reason why they’re over .500.”
This marks Rochester’s first in-season holiday tournament title since beating Western and Mishawaka in the Rochester Glass Holiday Invitational on Jan. 3, 2020. Rochester went on to win the sectional that year.
“You’ve got to hit a couple shots to get them to come out,” Burrus said of North White’s zone. “Ella did a good job of penetrating the lane. That’s why they started to space a little bit more, I think, was because they were worried about her driving from the wing. You’ve got to get better post action. That’s from our guards. That is our posts. Are they holding their position? How’s our passing? All of those things is going to be something we’re going to have to be ready for.
“The one good thing about this is we found a way and we grinded it out. A month or two ago, we might have lost both of those games.”
McCarter said “a lot” when asked how much progress the team has made.
“We’re making huge strides, and we’re going in the right direction,” McCarter said. “And we have continued as the season progresses.”
In the consolation game, Kouts handled Clinton Prairie 57-44.
Rochester 29, North White 18
ROCHESTER (29) (9-7)
Aubrey Wilson 2 3-4 7, Rylee Clevenger 4 0-0 10, Ella McCarter 4 0-0 9, Jadyn Field 1 0-2 2, Audrey Bolinger 0 0-2 0, Brailyn Hunter 0 0-0 0, Mia Howdeshell 0 1-2 1
TEAM: 11 4-10 29
NORTH WHITE (29) (1-14)
Abigail Tribbett 1 0-0 2, Kaylyn Applegate 0 2-2 2, Sable George 0 1-2 1, Katy Westerhouse 0 0-0 0, Autumn Reif 4 2-6 10, Morgan Carter 1 0-0 3, Melanie Crawford 0 0-0 0
TEAM: 6 5-10 18
Three-point field goals:
Rochester 3 (Clevenger 2, McCarter),
North White 1 (Carter)
Total fouls: Rochester 14, North White 10
Turnovers: Rochester 12, North White 26
Score by quarters
Rochester 7 11 8 3 – 29
North White 4 5 5 4 – 18
Small School Classic recap: McCarter’s career-high 21 helps Rochester hold off Kouts
BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS
Sports Editor, RTC
MONON — Ella McCarter hit five 3-pointers and scored a career-high 21 points to help the Rochester girls basketball team hold off Kouts 42-35 in the first round of the Small School Classic at North White Friday.
Rylee Clevenger had seven points, including the free throw that made it a three-possession game with 12.0 seconds left, and fellow starting guard Aubrey Wilson also had seven. Jadyn Field contributed five points and seven rebounds.
McCarter set a new career high for the second time in less than three weeks. Her previous high was 15 in a 36-14 win over Wabash on Dec. 9.
McCarter scored 10 points – she hit two treys and also hit two midrange jumpers – during a 14-0 Lady Z run covering the first and second quarters. That turned a 9-5 deficit into a 19-9 lead, and they stayed ahead the rest of the game.
She also hit two treys during a 10-0 run in the third quarter as the lead reached 30-15.
“She’s really had some really, really good practices here lately, and the Wabash game, she played really well,” Rochester coach Joel Burrus said of McCarter. “We’ve just been telling her, ‘Ella, there’s nowhere to hide with us. You’re going to shoot the basketball. We’re not worried about you missing. You’re a good shooter. You are one of the kids that puts the most time into what we do, offseason work and all those things. Reward yourself: Shoot the ball.’
“She’s showing confidence, but my disappointment is we didn’t put them away when we had the opportunity to put them away. That should have stayed a 15-to-20-point game.”
The lead reached 16 on two occasions in the fourth quarter, the last time at 36-20 on a Wilson 3-pointer in the fourth quarter.
At that point, Kouts went to a 1-3-1 zone press, and Ellah Young capped an 8-0 Kouts run with a steal and layup that cut the lead to 36-28.
A driving pullup banker from McCarter and a Clevenger 3 that seemingly touched every part of the rim got the lead back to 13, but a 7-0 run comprised of a Sophia Tikalsky floater in the lane, a Macie Sanders trey and an Ellie Nemeth layup in the post got Kouts to within 41-35.
“Late, the clock’s not going to move when you’re turning the ball over,” Burrus said. “And, you know, the officials were going to let that play out. We have to be strong with the ball. So, some things to talk about. The 1-3-1 gave us issues late in the game, so that’s something that we’re going to have to make some adjustments to.”
A scramble after a Wilson miss led to a held ball with 1:16 left, and Rochester had the arrow. Wilson was called for a charging foul, but Kouts missed a 3-pointer.
Wilson missed two free throws with 34.3 seconds left, but a Jaydin Field steal got Rochester the ball back, and Clevenger later hit her free throw.
Nemeth, a nimble freshman post, led Kouts with 16 points. Tikalsky, an effective playmaker who operated in the high post looking for Nemeth against Rochester’s 2-3 zone, had eight, all in the second half.
But it was too late to overcome Rochester’s first-half run.
“Well, I thought they started to get in the flow of the game, and they started to hit some shots,” Kouts coach Tim Schwartz said. “McCarter really had it dialed in today. What we saw from her on video, she didn’t take a lot of 3s. She usually attacked the basket. She really lined up and took some really nice shots and made them. That’s what good players do: They step up and make shots.
“And then they had some good defensive stops. They started figuring out what we were doing on offense, and we didn’t execute as well, and I thought their defense kind of helped get their offense going.”
Burrus said the team started to make it more difficult for Nemeth to catch the ball.
“We started to pinch a little bit better on the bottom,” Burrus said. “Kind of got that figured out. Our guards got in and started to jam down on the high post a little bit better, but we didn’t guard that very well.”
In the other first round game, North White handled Clinton Prairie 47-39 to snap a 14-game losing streak dating back to last season.
Rochester 42, Kouts 35
ROCHESTER (42) (8-7)
Aubrey Wilson 3 0-2 7, Rylee Clevenger 2 1-2 7, Ella McCarter 8 0-0 21, Jadyn Field 2 1-2 5, Audrey Bolinger 1 0-0 2, Brailyn Hunter 0 0-0 0, Mia Howdeshell 0 0-0 0
TEAM: 16 2-6 42
KOUTS (35) (4-11)
Ellah Young 2 0-0 5, Bella Birky 0 0-0 0, Sophia Tikalsky 4 0-1 8, Macie Sanders 2 0-0 6, Ellie Nemeth 7 2-2 16, Elizabeth Vankley 0 0-0 0, Alyssa Twedt 0 0-0 0, Olivia Miller 0 0-0 0
TEAM: 15 2-3 35
Three-point field goals:
Rochester 8 (McCarter 5, Clevenger 2, Wilson),
Kouts 3 (Sanders 2, Young)
Total fouls: Rochester 6, Kouts 9
Fouled out: Tikalsky (KOU), :34.3, fourth
Turnovers: Rochester 12, Kouts 12
Score by quarters
Rochester 11 9 10 12 – 42
Kouts 9 4 4 18 – 35
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