Plagued by ‘nerves,’ Argos falls to Trinity Greenlawn in sectional

Stults scores 19 in HS finale, Hellums adds 11 for Dragons

BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS

Sports Editor, RTC

Zhayne Hellums Luke Stults

NORTH JUDSON — It’s one thing to deal with sectional nerves.

It’s another thing to do it against the team that is No. 4 in the state in defensive scoring average.

The Argos boys basketball team succumbed to their nerves and Trinity Greenlawn’s stingy 2-3 zone defense in a 54-38 loss in a Class 1A, Sectional 51 quarterfinal at North Judson Wednesday.

Luke Stults scored 13 of his team-high 19 points in the fourth quarter for Argos, who finished 4-19. Zhayne Hellums hit three 3-pointers and added 11.

Stults and reserves Obe Salary, Preston Mollette and Gabe Ockerman are the seniors whose prep careers ended.

Argos matched Trinity Greenlawn’s 2-3 zone but not its results. Nathan Skendzel burned it for a game-high 21 points, and Ian Abbott added 14.

“I think that has a lot to do with nerves,” Kindig answered when asked if the team looked flat. “And I told the guys you find out a lot about people when it gets tough like this when you’ve got a lot on the line. We learned a lot about a few guys tonight, good or bad.”

Trinity Greenlawn improved to 15-8 and won their first sectional game in school history. Trinity Greenlawn has been an IHSAA member since the 2021-22 school year. They will play South Central (Union Mills), a 47-36 winner over North Judson in Wednesday’s second game, in the semifinals Friday.

Skendzel outscored the entire Argos team 15-14 in the first half. Abbott, a long-limbed 6-2 junior point guard, scored 11 in the second half. Nathan Palmer added three 3-pointers and scored nine.

Argos got within 18-14 in the second quarter when Stults’ short jumper crawled over the rim and fell, but Trinity Greenlawn went on a 10-0 run that bled into the third quarter. Argos did not score for over five minutes, and when Abbott hit a runner in the lane to complete the run, the lead was up to 14, and it stayed in double digits the rest of the way.

Stults picked up his second, third and fourth fouls within a 1:48 span of the third quarter – the fourth was a technical for retaliating against Busk after officials called Busk for a personal – and he sat for the final 4:40 of the third quarter.

Trinity Greenlawn led by as many as 21 in the fourth quarter.

“We’ve got to have him out there for a full 32 minutes or close to it,” Kindig said. “So his aggressiveness on both ends changes when you get that first foul. And we kind of have to change what we do with his aggression.”

Trinity Greenlawn came in allowing 37.4 points per game. Triton, who is also in Sectional 51, is No. 1 at 33.6.

Argos committed 16 turnovers while Trinity Greenlawn had five.

“When we got the ball inside there, we didn’t play very strong with it,” Kindig said. “They do a very good job of surrounding guys when it goes inside, and then we’ve got to be able to kick it out there. Even when we didn’t turn it over, we didn’t make good skip passes against the zone. So our shooters weren’t able to shoot. I just feel like we were a step slow all night.” 

With big men like Josh Heintzelman and Max Busk crowding the paint, the Titan defense made Stults work for his touches. Still, Argos jumped out to a 5-0 lead as Hellums hit two free throws and then a trey, from the left of the key.

But a Heintzelman 15-footer, a Palmer triple, a Skendzel triple from the left corner and an Abbott driving layup with two seconds left gave the Titans a 10-5 lead.

“We had a defensive game plan in place, and they did very well to execute that, and we’ve got a lot of guys that can score, and they got going,” Trinity Greenlawn coach Alex Rowland said, adding that Stults and Hellums were the focal points of their game plan.

Argos’ 38 points were split evenly – Stults had 19 and sophomores Hellums, Kenyan Beldon and Mekhi Austin combined for 19. Hellums, Beldon and Austin were elevated to the varsity last year as freshmen under then-coach Jason Breden.

“Where we were at against Bremen in November to where we are now, big difference,” Kindig said. “Obviously, it didn’t end the way we wanted it to be, but those sophomores came a long way, even from last year. So they’ve got to make that jump again, and we’ve got to have everybody make a big jump next year.”

With Stults graduating, Kindig was asked if this was the end of an era of Argos basketball that included 2024 grad Sean Richard most recently but also included J.J. Morris, Michael Richard, Teddy Redinger, Dylan Kindig, Jake Stults, Owen Nifong, Sam Manikowski, J.J. Riddle, Luke VanDerWeele, Ian Kindig, Drew Bollenbacher and Vinny Stone over the last decade.

“I would hope we’re going to have a few guys step up that are going to be the next guys,” Kindig said. “It needs to be multiple guys. You don’t want to be relying on one guy every year. We’ve got some young guys that are capable of improving. I would like for it to be an era of classes instead of a couple individuals here and there. Those kids are going to get better. They’re going to work at it. They got a year of what needs to happen and stuff.

“If you want to look at it as an era, it’s just who’s going to be next.”

Trinity Greenlawn 54, Argos 38

ARGOS (38) (4-19)

Kenyan Beldon 2 0-0 6, Mekhi Austin 1 0-0 2, Zhayne Hellums 3 2-2 11, Mack Calhoun 0 0-0 0, Luke Stults 9 1-2 19, Obe Salary 0 0-0 0, Preston Mollette 0 0-0 0, Corbin Rex 0 0-0 0, Joel Trump 0 0-0 0

TEAM: 15 3-4 38

TRINITY GREENLAWN (54) (15-8)

Nathan Palmer 3 0-0 9, Ian Abbott 5 4-8 14, Nathan Skendzel 7 3-6 21, Josh Heintzelman 3 0-2 6, Max Busk 2 0-0 4, Ambrose Mechtenberg 0 0-0 0, Elijah Badertscher 0 0-0 0, Thomas Wilson 0 0-0 0, John Paul Bernardy 0 0-0 0

TEAM: 20 7-16 54

Three-point field goals:

Argos 5 (Hellums 3, Beldon 2),

Trinity Greenlawn 7 (Skendzel 4, Palmer 3)

Total fouls: Argos 16, Trinity Greenlawn 10

Turnovers: Argos 16, Trinity Greenlawn 5

Score by quarters

Argos 5 9 6 18 – 38

Trinity Greenlawn 10 13 14 17 – 54