Columbia City deals Valley heartbreak with buzzer beaters

Val T.

2 days ago6 min read

Vikes’ Cooksey, Akase score 13 each, but Luce cites turnovers as key to loss

BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS

Sports Editor, RTC

Ian Cooksey Stephen Akase Blain Sheetz DeOndre Hamilton

NAPPANEE — It was like a riddle, except instead of making a Tippecanoe Valley boys basketball fan chuckle, it had a cruel punchline that might only make them cry or scream into a void.

How can a basketball team never lead in the second, third or fourth quarter but still win the game?

Columbia City never led Valley in the second, third or fourth quarters in the Class 3A, Sectional 20 final at NorthWood Saturday.

But they won 45-43 in an intense overtime nailbiter on Stratton Fuller’s basket at the buzzer.

The final sequence started with Columbia City calling timeout with 3.0 seconds left. Trey Deckman threw a high lob pass towards the opposite sideline. Fuller caught it, but Valley’s Stephen Akase knocked it out of his hands with 1.1 seconds left.

Neither team had a timeout left. Owen Marshall inbounded from the corner with Valley’s DeOndre Hamilton jumping in front of his face, but Landon Richmond screened Akase enough to allow Fuller space to catch Marshall’s lob pass. Fuller caught it and shot it in one motion and it dropped.

“The ball has to go to the rim with 1.5 seconds,” Valley coach Joe Luce said. “No doubt about it. One is heck of a play. Hats off to them. The other part of it, though, is you jam the guy standing inside the lane. And the bottom line is you just go get the ball.”

Fuller raised his index finger in the air and ran to the other end of the court as his elated teammates chased him down to celebrate. Meanwhile, Cooksey and Hamilton put their hands to their heads. The rest of the crushed Valley players walked solemnly to the bench for the handshake line.

“It’s called ‘cross lob,’ and that’s what we did,” Columbia City coach Matt Schauss said. “A cross-screen and lobbed it up there. It works every once in awhile. A terrible angle for the pass, but he threw a perfect pass, and Stratton obviously finished it off there. So it’s something we have practiced and something we do on occasion but not to that extent, I don’t think.”

The game might be immediately remembered as much for Marshall’s 3-pointer with one second left in regulation that tied the game and forced overtime as it will for Fuller’s game-winner, but according to Luce, the difference was turnovers.

Valley committed nine turnovers in the second half and overtime after committing just two in the first half. They could not hang on to a 10-point lead, and Columbia City took a game they never led by more than three points.

Columbia City improved to 17-9 and will face No. 2 South Bend St. Joe in a regional at South Bend Washington at 1 p.m. this Saturday.

Fuller, an Army football recruit who has gained a reputation for his clutch exploits in both sports, scored 18 points, and Landon Richmond added 13. Marshall chipped in with nine.

Ian Cooksey had 13 points for Valley, including all five Viking points in the overtime. Akase also had 13 to go with eight rebounds, Blain Sheetz had nine, De’Ondre Hamilton had seven, and Davis Cowan had one.

Valley finished 20-6. This marked the eighth 20-win season in school history.

“Coumbia City had a chance to fold many times,” Luce said. “They didn’t. We put ourselves in a position that we just made questionable passes, questionable drives. I can’t say inexperience because we’ve faced very good pressure throughout the year. Ultimately, we didn’t take care of it, and they won the game.”

Valley emerged from a first quarter that featured five ties with a 16-12 lead thanks to eight points from Akase. Valley led 27-17 at halftime and 29-25 after three quarters, and they still led 37-31 with a minute left in regulation.

Richmond scored off a post entry feed from Trey Deckman to cut the lead to four.

Columbia City pressed and hemmed Akase in near the right sideline. His hit-ahead pass went astray into the frontcourt. About five feet from the baseline, Sheetz flipped it back to keep it in play, but Richmond stole it.

Fuller missed a short runner, but Columbia City reserve Camden Closson tipped it back to Deckman, and Hamilton fouled Marshall with 27.2 seconds left.

The 5-11 Fuller took the inbounds pass on the block, took a dribble to set himself and muscled in a basket over the 6-6 Akase to make it 37-35.

Columbia City took their last timeout with 21.9 seconds left.

Fuller fouled Cowan with 19.2 seconds left, and he split a pair of free throws to give Valley a 3-point lead.

Columbia City could not get an immediate look at a shot, and Akase tipped Fuller’s pass towards the baseline out of bounds with 7.9 seconds left.

Marshall’s inbounds pass from the baseline led Richmond all the way into the backcourt, and Sheetz used Valley’s last foul to give with 3.9 seconds left. Luce called his final timeout.

Marshall sprung free and shot from the volleyball line near the Columbia City bench.

It hit nothing but net, and the game went to overtime.

“The winning and losing play was not the 3-point shot at the end,” Luce said. “It was our ability to not take care of the basketball. We turned it over in the third and fourth differently than we did in the first half. And that put you in a situation that some of those plays at the end really are highlighted. But those last two great plays by them, we didn’t defend as we should’ve, but those were not the winning and losing plays.”

Fuller’s driving layup with 2:40 left in the extra period made it 40-38.

Cooksey took a dribble handoff from Hamilton and headed downhill along the right baseline. He established his pivot foot, spun and hit a five-footer to tie the game again.

Marshall drove and scored with 58 seconds left to give Columbia City a 42-40 lead. Cooksey missed a 3, and Fuller split a pair of free throws with 43.8 seconds left.

After a Valley timeout with 36.4 seconds left, Akase screened off two Columbia City defenders, and Cooksey curled off it and buried a game-tying 3-pointer.

“Both great players and both kids were big on our scouting report,” Schauss said of Akase and Cooksey. “They’re going to score points.”

Valley was leading 18-17 after a Fuller 3-pointer with 5:12 left in the half, but Valley went on a 9-0 run to close out the half. Hamilton scored on a putback of a Cooksey driving miss, Sheetz scored on a drive and then again on another layup off a Hamilton assist from underneath the basket.

When Cooksey ran behind a Cowan screen and drilled a 3 with eight seconds left, Valley led by 10.

Some Sheetz sleight of hand – he faked a dribble handoff to give himself an open path to the basket for a layup – made it 29-20 with 5:00 left in the third.

But Valley also committed four turnovers in the quarter, and Columbia City cut the deficit to 29-25 after three quarters.

Valley regained some offensive rhythm in the fourth. Cooksey scored on a spin turnaround, Sheetz hit a layup, and Akase hit a floater, but Columbia City kept answering, and the 6-4 Richmond scored on a drive to the rim to make it 35-31.

Hamilton split a pair of free throws with 1:44 left, and Akase made one of two with 1:30 left as Valley went back up by six again.

“This game will linger for a lifetime,” Luce said. “And I just hope again that positively they look at it in that nature and not in a light that affects them in any way. Because they should walk out here with nothing but pride.”

Columbia City 45, Valley 43 (OT)

VALLEY (43) (20-6)

Davis Cowan 0 1-2 1, Ian Cooksey 5 0-0 13, DeOndre Hamilton 3 1-2 7, Blain Sheetz 4 1-2 9, Stephen Akase 5 3-4 13, Owen Omondi 0 0-0 0

TEAM: 17 6-10 43

COLUMBIA CITY (45) (17-9)

Owen Marshall 4 0-0 9, Josh Eberly 0 0-0 0, Stratton Fuller 8 1-2 18, Landon Richmond 5 3-4 13, Trey Deckman 1 0-0 3, Camden Closson 1 0-0 2

TEAM: 19 4-6 45

Three-point field goals:

Valley 3 (Cooksey 3),

Columbia City 3 (Fuller, Marshall, Deckman)

Total fouls: Valley 11, Columbia City 15

Fouled out: Eberly (CC), 1:30, fourth