What we learned holiday hoops edition: On Lake Central, Decatur Central, scorer's table fun
We saw a lot of high school basketball over the past week-plus. We’ll have plenty more coming this week beyond the usual Monday wrapup column but for now … five things we learned from the week in hoops:
Ryan Sexson has Lake Central off to 9-0 start
First-year Lake Central coach Ryan Sexson brought his undefeated team to the Paul Loggan Memorial Invitational at North Central. The Indians left Indianapolis still unbeaten at 9-0 after victories over Pike (61-45) and Park Tudor (64-57).
If that Sexson name sounds familiar – and it did to several people I talked to on Thursday at North Central – it is because his grandfather, Joe Sexson, was a decorated athlete at Tech and Purdue and basketball coach as an assistant at Purdue and head coach at Butler from 1977-89. Ryan Sexson is reminded every day about his grandfather’s accomplishments.
“His 1952 Mr. Basketball jersey, Indiana All-Star jersey, hangs in my office,” Sexson said. “Luck of the draw (that I have it). Since I’m in the profession, I guess. It means a lot to me. I grew up in Hinkle Fieldhouse, my dad (Rick) was his assistant at Butler, so basketball has always been a big part of the Sexson family. I coached small college basketball for a while, so it’s been cool to get back into Indiana high school basketball where it all started for ‘Jumbo’ back in ’52.”
Basketball, and coaching, is in his blood. Sexson, a 1998 Lafayette Jeff graduate, coached at Calumet College of St. Joseph in Hammond for 13 seasons before getting out of college coaching in 2020 with two young sons to raise with his wife Sarah (Bacan), a former star athlete at Griffith and now a teacher at Crown Point. Sexson was an assistant at Hanover Central before he was hired to replace Dave Milausnic, who stepped down after winning 264 games in 19 seasons, including a 4A state finals appearance against Tech in 2014.
“I’ve got two young boys and I was just missing too much,” Sexson said. “I was missing their games and missing things to go out recruiting and I wasn’t going to sacrifice that. You only get to be a dad once and I wanted to be around so when this opportunity presented itself it was like, ‘We can practice at 2:30 and I’m home most days by 5:30.’ I can still get to their games, too. There’s no way I could do that at the college level.”
Sexson said he did not necessarily expect a 9-0 start coming into the season. Jake Smith, a 6-6 senior, is the team’s most experienced player. But the Indians also returned senior guard Dorien Beatty, who missed much of last year due to injury and 6-2 junior guard Zachary Greene has emerged as an athletic playmaker.
“This team finished second-to-last in the conference last year,” Sexson said of the Indians, who were 16-9 overall and lost in the sectional semifinal to Munster. “When I came in, I said, ‘I want to win (Duneland Athletic Conference) championships and get deep in March. There are some things that have to be changed and get better and that starts on the defensive end. We’ve been really good defensively and bought into our schemes and they are just playing hard. They are playing with an edge and a chip on their shoulder. On the offensive end, they understand Jake is our guy and we’re going to play through him. Up to this point, I’ve been very pleased with their buy-in. They understand every practice means something. A lot of these guys want to play college basketball so when you get to that next level, you can’t just show up to practice. You have to practice like somebody is going to steal your lunch money and take your scholarship.”
Every program in in the eight-team DAC is at least .500 and there are several contenders, including Valparaiso (9-3), Crown Point (6-3), Portage (6-3) and Chesterton (6-4). All of these tests and more are to come, but Sexson’s first team looks like one that can compete for the conference and the sectional at East Chicago Central.
Decatur Central’s Cunningham has big upside
The more I see of the 2025 in-state class, the more I like. A player who might be flying a bit under the radar is 6-5 guard Melakih Cunningham, who helped Decatur Central to the championship of the four-game New Castle holiday tournament on Wednesday.
Cunningham had 18 points in Decatur Central’s 57-45 win over Norwell and added 11 points in the Hawks’ 64-60 win over New Castle in the championship. Senior guard KC Berry led Decatur Central with 22 points in both games.
“Those two are obviously our best scorers,” Decatur Central coach Bryan Surber said. “KC is a four-year starter and coming in off football (the Hawks played in the Class 5A state championship), he’s kind of got off to a slow start but I’m proud of him because he’s come in and trusted his guys and really shared the basketball. That’s probably the first time he’s been over 15 this season, so I’m really proud of him. With Melakih, it’s been a long time since we’ve had a kid work as hard as him. As a 6-5 kid, I think the sky is the limit for him.”
Cunningham is averaging 14.4 points per game for the Hawks, who are 6-2 heading into the 2024 portion of the schedule. He showed promise last year as a sophomore, averaging 8.5 points and 6.0 rebounds, shooting 33.7% (29-for-86) from the 3-point line.
“Last year as a sophomore he did a really nice job of changing his game a little bit,” Surber said. “As a middle schooler and freshman, he kind of hung out and tried to score. Last year he kind of changed his game and ended up being our leading rebounder. He’s going to continue to do that, but we also need him to score a little bit more for us and he’s done that.”
Surber said Cunningham, who was 6-1 as a freshman, “is still learning how to be 6-5.” But his offseason work has paid off with an improved mid-range game on offense and added to his athleticism on the defensive end (he is averaging a team-high 6.5 rebounds and 2.1 steals).
“I’ve seen my game change a lot,” Cunningham said. “I can dribble the ball better, I can shoot the mid-range, dunk. Last year I was limited. I don’t really get bumped around anymore. I got a lot more athletic from last year to this year and it helped make everything a lot easier.”
Decatur Central has faced predominantly zone defenses this season in part due to 31.3% shooting from the 3-point line. The Hawks were 14-for-39 from the arc in the two wins at New Castle, however. Cunningham, who said he has heard from IUPUI in the early recruiting process, is capable of shooting better than 25% (8-for-32) he has posted so far this season.
“Teams are going to have to play zone because we have a lot of threats on our team,” Cunningham said. “But we’ve been playing well against the zone, and we’ve got Nash (Sigmund), who can shoot so it opens it up for us.”
Sigmund has been effective almost exclusively as a 3-point shooter, hitting 13-for-37 and averaging 5.6 points per game. Other than Cunningham, Berry (12.9 ppg, 4.5 rebounds) and the 5-11 Sigmund, other key contributors for Decatur Central are 6-6 senior Ayden Lawson (8.5 ppg, 6.0 rebounds), 6-3 junior Ty’reese Burnett (7.0 ppg, 3.8 rebounds, 3.6 assists) and 6-foot junior Eric Hopson (5.6 ppg, 3.1 rebounds).
“Ty’reese brings the energy for us on defense,” Cunningham said. “I’m definitely trying to be more of a leader. We lost four seniors from last year’s team so I’m trying to step up and be more of a leader since our team is still pretty young. Our best basketball is definitely ahead of us.”
Checking into games is a fun science experiment
You would think it is an easy thing, right? The coach tells you to substitute into the game. You hustle down to the spot in front of the scorer’s table, sit down or kneel down and wait to be called into the game by the referee.
And yet …
I covered about 15 tournament games or so over the holiday break and was again struck at amount of “checking into the game” mishaps we seem to have. I posted on Twitter that we might need a camp with stations for various “checking into the game” scenarios. Most responses from people blamed travel basketball, where checking into the game might be a little informal compared to a high school game. Maybe.
David Letterman-style, here are the top-10 checking into the game issues I saw during the holiday tournaments and hundreds of other games over the years:
10: Player running on court directly from the bench to the court. Believe it or not, this happens. I’ve seen it. Coach says, “Get in!” and player just runs directly to the game. Hey, just bypass the middle man, right? This is probably more common at the younger levels.
9: Not checking in during a timeout or break in action. This probably is a result of travel basketball. Normally there is an assistant reminding the player, “Make sure you check in.”
8: Number not in the scorebook. I have seen this probably three or four times already this season. Not the player’s fault but usually leads to confusion and coach looking down the bench at his assistants for not getting the numbers in the scorebook. Sort of embarrassing and, more importantly, a technical foul.
7: Player does not sub in when motioned. You would think the player being subbed in would be waiting to get into the game like it is Christmas morning. And usually, they are. But I’ve also seen players spaced out or unaware (or both) and the official has to motion several times for him to enter the game.
6: Player subs in for two players or none. I saw this happen both ways over the holiday break. Both were corrected before the team was playing with four players or six players. One game at Fishers, the coach realized it at the last second, “We have four players on the court!” and the incorrectly subbed out player bolted back from the bench to the floor.
5: Player subbing in doesn’t say his number. The official scorer might not see a jersey number and will ask the subbing player. That may lead to subbing player saying number he is subbing in for instead of own jersey number or forgetting his own number entirely. Some scorers want both numbers, it seems. I’m not sure the protocol here to be honest. Maybe it varies.
4: Standing or kneeling in the line of sight from the official scorer to the court. How many times do you see this? Action stops on the court for a foul. Player(s) waiting to check in the game stand up directly in front of the scorer’s table as the official is about to signal the foul call. Official motions to “get down.” Player doesn’t see it or notice as he is looking to court for his substitution partner and just walks on to floor without being motioned in by official. This must happen almost every game I cover.
3: Player doesn’t know who he’s replacing. This is not necessarily a “checking in the game” problem but can lead to confusion and a quick ramping up of anger from the coaches and officials and more confusion from the player entering the game and those on the floor. Can involve a coaching shoving a player back on to the court who was not supposed to be subbed out.
2: Incorrect check-in placement. I often sit at or around the scorer’s table and see this all the time. The player kneels next to the end of the table, sometimes telling me he’s about to check in (I usually point down to the middle of the table or nudge him to move down) and the scorer yells at him to move down. Confusion reigns. Shouting ensues: “Move down, move down!”
1: The player checks in without being waved in by the official. You see this all the time. Buzzer sounds. Action stops. Player rises from the correct position on the court, in front of official scorer, and just enters the game before the official tells him. Official blows whistle, motions for him to return to spot, then motions him into game. Player looks around like, “What was the point of that?”
As you might be able to tell, I get a kick out of even the mundane elements of basketball. One of the funniest scorer’s table moments I’ve seen (at least to me) was a game several years ago (I’ll leave out the teams and the official) when the home team scorekeeper was becoming increasingly frustrated with his team’s play and some of the calls that were going against his team. The official came over to motion a foul call to him and the scorekeeper waved him off with both hands as if to say, “Get outta here.” The official said his name and warned him, “No more.” Well, he did it again a few seconds later. Boom. Technical foul. The coach had no clue what was going on until the referee told him to find a new scorekeeper the rest of the night.
Young Triton Central making strides
Coach Mark James got his 600th career win in the first game of the season, a 62-22 Triton Central win at Morristown. James, in his first season at Triton Central and 42nd overall, brought his Class 2A second-ranked Tigers to New Castle for the Trojans’ holiday tournament, where they lost a pair of close games to 3A opponents – 48-44 to New Castle and 47-40 to Norwell.
Those two losses dropped Triton Central to 7-3 on the season going into the four-team Shelby County tournament next week at Southwestern of Shelbyville with the host school, Waldron and Morristown.
“It’s good for us to play bigger schools like this to find out where we’re at and what we need to work on,” James said. “We’ve got really good kids who play hard, and they don’t make mistakes on purpose. We’ll see if we can learn from it.”
James took over a program on the rise. The Tigers won a sectional title two years ago and went 17-7 last season under coach Kyle Ballard, a former James’ assistant who took over at Franklin Central this season. Eli Sego, a 6-foot sophomore guard, is averaging 18.4 points, 4.3 rebounds and 2.2 steals and shooting 55% from the 3-point line.
“Eli can be a really good player,” James said. “He’s got a lot of tools, he can defend, he can shoot and he’s young. He’s got a big upside. I think he could be a Division I player. I’ve coached a lot of good guards and he’s right up there with some of better guards I’ve had.”
Triton Central’s second-leading scorer is 6-6 junior Silas Blair (13.8 ppg, 4.5 rebounds, 38% 3-point shooter).
“Silas is showing he can play a little bit,” James said. “Those two kids have pretty big upside and (sophomore Max Crouse) can be a be pretty good player.”
Crouse is averaging 9.7 points and 3.2 assists per game. Junior Sam Collier (5.2 ppg, 2.5 rebounds) is another major contributor. James retired from teaching last year after finishing out his tenure as coach at Perry Meridian.
“You just have more freedom in your day,” James said. “It makes it less stressful for me and I have more time to focus on basketball and that’s enjoyable. It’s a really, really good school district and Perry was too, with a very good administration. It’s just that comparatively, we can compete better than the people we played against at Perry. That’s not cutting anybody, it’s just the reality. I’ve been very fortunate in my career to coach some very good people and I think that’s what is occurring right now.”
Happy sendoff to 2023
I had a blast seeing so many people during the holiday tournaments that I hadn’t seen in a long time or only see once in a while. I spent an entire game at New Castle on Wednesday chatting with former North Central coach and recent Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame inductee Doug Mitchell. Some of my favorite memories in this job involve talking to Mitchell in his office after games or practices. You forget most of the game details over the years but remember those shared experiences. At least I do.
I will have plenty more coverage coming from the holiday tournaments and more. But for now … Happy New Year.
Call Star reporter Kyle Neddenriep at (317) 444-6649.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: What we learned holiday hoops edition: Checking into game can be interesting
