Triton Trojans Tops In 2000
July 28, 2016 at 4:25 p.m.
!photo=N0306007.JPG
Photo by Gary Nieter, Times-Union
The state champion Triton Trojans take questions during the press conference after Saturday's 57-54 overtime win over Rising Sun in the Class A state championship.
INDIANAPOLIS -ÊTriton's girls basketball team won Saturday's Class A state title, and the unlikely heroine was a 5-foot-7 dimple-faced, black-haired, soft-spoken, sleepy-eyed sophomore who attempted one shot.
That sophomore - Amber Feldman - hit her third three-pointer of the year as time ticked off the clock to give unranked Triton (20-7) a 57-54 overtime win over No. 4 Rising Sun (25-3). The state title is the first for Triton's girls basketball team, which also won its first semistate and regional titles this season.
"I don't know if I'll ever get over this," Rising Sun coach Mark Fette said. "It was right there, in our hands. Somebody reached in and tore our hearts out."
"Somebody" was Feldman, a reserve who had made 2 of 12 three-pointers this season. But on this day, as sunlight streamed onto the court through the glass windows at the 72-year-old grand old barn known as Hinkle Fieldhouse, her shot was meant to be.
"How do you start?" said Triton coach Mark Heeter, sporting the same striped shirt and dark pants he has worn in every postseason game. "We had an unbelievable finish to an unbelievable game."
The toughest thing for Feldman on this day may have not been hitting the shot but talking about it in front of reporters crammed into a small room. On a Triton team full of outgoing players, Feldman is an exception, and as her coaches urged her to speak louder and look up, reporters leaned forward in their chairs to pick up her words.
"This is good for her. She never talks," Heeter joked.
"I knew I just had to shoot it," said Feldman, who is typically one of the first reserves used by Heeter. "I just watched it go in and was stunned. It didn't feel good, didn't feel like it would go in. It was luck.
"I dreamed about things like this, but I never imagined it would happen."
Feldman hit her three at the right arc, near the same location Bobby Plump hit his game-winner in 1954 to lift Milan to the state title.
A Feldman hitting a big basket for Triton is nothing new. Amber's second cousin, Lorea Feldman, is the leading scorer in Triton history and played for the University of Michigan.
When someone asked if Fette thought Feldman traveled, he refused to bite.
"I'm not gonna comment," he said. "I saw some other calls in the other game, too."
Without forward Missy Nifong, Feldman wouldn't have had a chance to win the game. The Trojans hit three three-pointers in the final minute of overtime, and Nifong delivered two of them. Nifong led Triton with 17 points.
Rising Sun held its largest lead of the game, 54-48, when Nifong, Triton's lone senior, took over the game.
With three starters -Êfreshman guard Ashli Senff, junior Brandie Ganshorn and junior Rachel Speicher - fouled out, Nifong told her teammates to hop on, because she would carry them. In for Senff, Ganshorn and Speicher were junior Tommi Kreiter, junior Janell Salisbury and Feldman.
Nifong's first three-pointer, a bank shot high off the backboard with 59 seconds left, pulled Triton within 54-51. Fourteen seconds later she hit another to tie the game at 54-54. Both threes came at the left arc, and hitting both put the momentum squarely behind Triton and its now maniacal 1,500 fans, most dressed in blue and yellow.
"As a leader, I'm supposed to step up," Nifong said. "When the three girls fouled out, I told Betsy (Salyer), 'It's our time to shine.'"
Rising Sun forward Dawn DeDreu blanketed Nifong both times, to no avail.
"I couldn't even see the basket on the first one, the girl had a hand in my face," Nifong said. "I saw it bank in ... it was great. I didn't want to get blocked, so I put more into it.
"The second one, I felt that one. We had all the momentum. I knew it was in there."
Senior Jessica Brock, the leading scorer in boys and girls basketball history at Rising Sun, drove through the lane and attempted to put the Shiners ahead with 26 seconds left. But Salyer swatted her shot and grabbed the ball.
The Trojans ran the clock down to 15 seconds then called timeout. Jessica Brock blocked a shot attempt with five seconds left. Kreiter received the in-bounds pass and delivered the assist to Feldman for her only three points in the game.
"I could sit here and say I drew up all those three-point shots, but the girls came through and hit them," Heeter said. "Down six, I looked at Missy and said, 'We gotta start shooting threes.'"
Senff, who fouled out with 1:14 left in the fourth quarter, finished with 14 points and nine rebounds. Ganshorn, who fouled out with 1:08 left in overtime, added 11 points, seven rebounds and four assists. Salyer grabbed 12 rebounds as the Trojans outrebounded Rising Sun 59-45 in a game that saw the two teams combine to miss 99 shots from the field.
As has been the case all season, the 6-foot Brock twins paced Rising Sun. Jessica Brock finished with 21 points on 7-of-26 shooting and 13 rebounds. Jennifer Brock, who's played with a broken right thumb since the sectional and was in Methodist Hospital Friday with an IV stuck in her arm to battle dehydration, added 12 points and 15 rebounds.
Triton held the lead most of the game and appeared on the verge of blowing it open in the third quarter. The Trojans led 38-27 with 2:45 left in the quarter, but then a rash of turnovers - three in the final two minutes of the third quarter and two in the first 63 seconds of the fourth - allowed the Shiners to pull within 38-36.
"Rising Sun took us out of our offense in the second half with their half-court trapping defense," Heeter said. "We hadn't seen that kind of half-court pressure all year. We had seen full-court pressure and handled that."
Rising Sun grabbed the lead at 45-44 with 2:04 left in the fourth quarter, the Shiners' first lead since 16-15 with 5:03 left in the second quarter. The Shiners had a chance to win the game in regulation, as they held the ball the final 48 seconds. They never called a timeout, and Jessica Brock's attempt in the waning seconds missed, sending the game into overtime.
"No, I didn't want to take a timeout," Fette said. "I thought we would get a shot off."
More Triton turnovers allowed Rising Sun to build its 54-48 lead in overtime. Guard Mary Messer hit two free throws after her steal to put the Shiners up 52-48, then Jessica Brock stole the ball and hit two free throws to push the lead to 54-48 with 1:08 left.
Nine seconds later, Nifong sent the Trojans on their improbable run.
Afterward, the Brock twins, sitting side by side and sporting their red second-place ribbons on their blue uniforms, were at ease and took all questions in stride.
"This is a game, even if I would have to replay it, I wouldn't change a thing," said Jessica Brock, gracious in the loss. "Someone has to lose, and someone has to win."
After Triton drubbed Lapel 64-38 in last week's the Triton Semistate, Triton junior reserve Shelly Miller declared the Trojans a team of destiny.
Fette concurs.
"Our girls played hard," he said, "but it was one of those games where somebody was looking down on Triton."
And He chose a silent assassin - Amber Feldman - to deliver the kill.
Notes: Several local referees worked the state finals. They Leesburg's Eric Coburn, Pierceton's Jay C. Smith, Rochester's Marvin Davis and Akron's Kirk Robinson. Robinson was an alternate. ... Ex-Warsaw player Judi Warren, the first Miss Basketball who guided the Tigers to the first girls basketball state championship, was one of 12 players named to the First Silver Era team. The top 12 players of the first 25 years were named to the team by a 19-person panel that included media, coaches, game officials and athletic administrators. ... One of the referees who worked Triton's game, Norman Delph, is deaf. ... Rising Sun played two reserves for a total of 10 minutes. Neither scored any points. ... Four Triton bench players combined to play 27 minutes and scored six points. ... Triton shot 23 of 73 (32 percent) from the field, while Rising Sun shot 18 of 67 (27 percent). ... After shooting no free throws in the first half, Rising Sun finished the game 14 of 25 (56 percent) from the line, while Triton was 6 of 11 (55 percent). ... Triton had 21 turnovers and Rising Sun 14.
CLASS A STATE FINALS
Triton 11 17 10 8 11 - 57
No. 4 Rising Sun 14 6 13 13 8 - 54
Triton FG FT A S R Pts.
Nifong (F) 7-18 0-0 1 2 8 17
Senff (G) 5-18 4-4 3 2 9 14
Ganshorn (G) 5-10 0-0 4 0 7 11
Salyer (C) 3-13 0-0 1 0 12 6
Speicher (F) 1-7 1-4 3 0 6 3
Salisbury 1-6 1-3 0 0 4 3
Feldman 1-1 0-0 2 1 4 3
Kreiter 0-0 0-0 1 0 0 0
Miller 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
Team -- -- -- -- 9 --
Totals 23-73 6-11 15 5 59 57
Rising Sun FG FT A S R Pts.
Ja. Brock (G) 7-26 4-4 3 3 13 21
Jr. Brock (F) 5-14 2-5 1 3 15 12
Turner (C) 4-16 1-2 4 1 3 10
DeDreu (F) 1-5 4-10 2 1 6 6
Messer (G) 1-6 3-4 3 9 3 5
Thies 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
Thompson 0-0 0-0 0 2 0 0
Team -- -- -- -- 5 --
Totals 18-67 14-25 13 19 45 54
Three-point goals -ÊTriton 5-11 (Nifong 3-6, Ganshorn 1-3, Feldman 1-1, Senff 0-1), Rising Sun 4-16 (Ja. Brock 3-6, Turner 1-5, DeDreu 0-3, Jr. Brock 0-2). Turnovers - Rising Sun 14, Triton 21. Fouled out -ÊSenff, Speicher, Ganshorn. Total fouls - Triton 22, Rising Sun 13. Officials -ÊNorm Delph, Doug Bauman.
Records -ÊTriton 20-7, Rising Sun 25-3 [[In-content Ad]]
!photo=N0306007.JPG
Photo by Gary Nieter, Times-Union
The state champion Triton Trojans take questions during the press conference after Saturday's 57-54 overtime win over Rising Sun in the Class A state championship.
INDIANAPOLIS -ÊTriton's girls basketball team won Saturday's Class A state title, and the unlikely heroine was a 5-foot-7 dimple-faced, black-haired, soft-spoken, sleepy-eyed sophomore who attempted one shot.
That sophomore - Amber Feldman - hit her third three-pointer of the year as time ticked off the clock to give unranked Triton (20-7) a 57-54 overtime win over No. 4 Rising Sun (25-3). The state title is the first for Triton's girls basketball team, which also won its first semistate and regional titles this season.
"I don't know if I'll ever get over this," Rising Sun coach Mark Fette said. "It was right there, in our hands. Somebody reached in and tore our hearts out."
"Somebody" was Feldman, a reserve who had made 2 of 12 three-pointers this season. But on this day, as sunlight streamed onto the court through the glass windows at the 72-year-old grand old barn known as Hinkle Fieldhouse, her shot was meant to be.
"How do you start?" said Triton coach Mark Heeter, sporting the same striped shirt and dark pants he has worn in every postseason game. "We had an unbelievable finish to an unbelievable game."
The toughest thing for Feldman on this day may have not been hitting the shot but talking about it in front of reporters crammed into a small room. On a Triton team full of outgoing players, Feldman is an exception, and as her coaches urged her to speak louder and look up, reporters leaned forward in their chairs to pick up her words.
"This is good for her. She never talks," Heeter joked.
"I knew I just had to shoot it," said Feldman, who is typically one of the first reserves used by Heeter. "I just watched it go in and was stunned. It didn't feel good, didn't feel like it would go in. It was luck.
"I dreamed about things like this, but I never imagined it would happen."
Feldman hit her three at the right arc, near the same location Bobby Plump hit his game-winner in 1954 to lift Milan to the state title.
A Feldman hitting a big basket for Triton is nothing new. Amber's second cousin, Lorea Feldman, is the leading scorer in Triton history and played for the University of Michigan.
When someone asked if Fette thought Feldman traveled, he refused to bite.
"I'm not gonna comment," he said. "I saw some other calls in the other game, too."
Without forward Missy Nifong, Feldman wouldn't have had a chance to win the game. The Trojans hit three three-pointers in the final minute of overtime, and Nifong delivered two of them. Nifong led Triton with 17 points.
Rising Sun held its largest lead of the game, 54-48, when Nifong, Triton's lone senior, took over the game.
With three starters -Êfreshman guard Ashli Senff, junior Brandie Ganshorn and junior Rachel Speicher - fouled out, Nifong told her teammates to hop on, because she would carry them. In for Senff, Ganshorn and Speicher were junior Tommi Kreiter, junior Janell Salisbury and Feldman.
Nifong's first three-pointer, a bank shot high off the backboard with 59 seconds left, pulled Triton within 54-51. Fourteen seconds later she hit another to tie the game at 54-54. Both threes came at the left arc, and hitting both put the momentum squarely behind Triton and its now maniacal 1,500 fans, most dressed in blue and yellow.
"As a leader, I'm supposed to step up," Nifong said. "When the three girls fouled out, I told Betsy (Salyer), 'It's our time to shine.'"
Rising Sun forward Dawn DeDreu blanketed Nifong both times, to no avail.
"I couldn't even see the basket on the first one, the girl had a hand in my face," Nifong said. "I saw it bank in ... it was great. I didn't want to get blocked, so I put more into it.
"The second one, I felt that one. We had all the momentum. I knew it was in there."
Senior Jessica Brock, the leading scorer in boys and girls basketball history at Rising Sun, drove through the lane and attempted to put the Shiners ahead with 26 seconds left. But Salyer swatted her shot and grabbed the ball.
The Trojans ran the clock down to 15 seconds then called timeout. Jessica Brock blocked a shot attempt with five seconds left. Kreiter received the in-bounds pass and delivered the assist to Feldman for her only three points in the game.
"I could sit here and say I drew up all those three-point shots, but the girls came through and hit them," Heeter said. "Down six, I looked at Missy and said, 'We gotta start shooting threes.'"
Senff, who fouled out with 1:14 left in the fourth quarter, finished with 14 points and nine rebounds. Ganshorn, who fouled out with 1:08 left in overtime, added 11 points, seven rebounds and four assists. Salyer grabbed 12 rebounds as the Trojans outrebounded Rising Sun 59-45 in a game that saw the two teams combine to miss 99 shots from the field.
As has been the case all season, the 6-foot Brock twins paced Rising Sun. Jessica Brock finished with 21 points on 7-of-26 shooting and 13 rebounds. Jennifer Brock, who's played with a broken right thumb since the sectional and was in Methodist Hospital Friday with an IV stuck in her arm to battle dehydration, added 12 points and 15 rebounds.
Triton held the lead most of the game and appeared on the verge of blowing it open in the third quarter. The Trojans led 38-27 with 2:45 left in the quarter, but then a rash of turnovers - three in the final two minutes of the third quarter and two in the first 63 seconds of the fourth - allowed the Shiners to pull within 38-36.
"Rising Sun took us out of our offense in the second half with their half-court trapping defense," Heeter said. "We hadn't seen that kind of half-court pressure all year. We had seen full-court pressure and handled that."
Rising Sun grabbed the lead at 45-44 with 2:04 left in the fourth quarter, the Shiners' first lead since 16-15 with 5:03 left in the second quarter. The Shiners had a chance to win the game in regulation, as they held the ball the final 48 seconds. They never called a timeout, and Jessica Brock's attempt in the waning seconds missed, sending the game into overtime.
"No, I didn't want to take a timeout," Fette said. "I thought we would get a shot off."
More Triton turnovers allowed Rising Sun to build its 54-48 lead in overtime. Guard Mary Messer hit two free throws after her steal to put the Shiners up 52-48, then Jessica Brock stole the ball and hit two free throws to push the lead to 54-48 with 1:08 left.
Nine seconds later, Nifong sent the Trojans on their improbable run.
Afterward, the Brock twins, sitting side by side and sporting their red second-place ribbons on their blue uniforms, were at ease and took all questions in stride.
"This is a game, even if I would have to replay it, I wouldn't change a thing," said Jessica Brock, gracious in the loss. "Someone has to lose, and someone has to win."
After Triton drubbed Lapel 64-38 in last week's the Triton Semistate, Triton junior reserve Shelly Miller declared the Trojans a team of destiny.
Fette concurs.
"Our girls played hard," he said, "but it was one of those games where somebody was looking down on Triton."
And He chose a silent assassin - Amber Feldman - to deliver the kill.
Notes: Several local referees worked the state finals. They Leesburg's Eric Coburn, Pierceton's Jay C. Smith, Rochester's Marvin Davis and Akron's Kirk Robinson. Robinson was an alternate. ... Ex-Warsaw player Judi Warren, the first Miss Basketball who guided the Tigers to the first girls basketball state championship, was one of 12 players named to the First Silver Era team. The top 12 players of the first 25 years were named to the team by a 19-person panel that included media, coaches, game officials and athletic administrators. ... One of the referees who worked Triton's game, Norman Delph, is deaf. ... Rising Sun played two reserves for a total of 10 minutes. Neither scored any points. ... Four Triton bench players combined to play 27 minutes and scored six points. ... Triton shot 23 of 73 (32 percent) from the field, while Rising Sun shot 18 of 67 (27 percent). ... After shooting no free throws in the first half, Rising Sun finished the game 14 of 25 (56 percent) from the line, while Triton was 6 of 11 (55 percent). ... Triton had 21 turnovers and Rising Sun 14.
CLASS A STATE FINALS
Triton 11 17 10 8 11 - 57
No. 4 Rising Sun 14 6 13 13 8 - 54
Triton FG FT A S R Pts.
Nifong (F) 7-18 0-0 1 2 8 17
Senff (G) 5-18 4-4 3 2 9 14
Ganshorn (G) 5-10 0-0 4 0 7 11
Salyer (C) 3-13 0-0 1 0 12 6
Speicher (F) 1-7 1-4 3 0 6 3
Salisbury 1-6 1-3 0 0 4 3
Feldman 1-1 0-0 2 1 4 3
Kreiter 0-0 0-0 1 0 0 0
Miller 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
Team -- -- -- -- 9 --
Totals 23-73 6-11 15 5 59 57
Rising Sun FG FT A S R Pts.
Ja. Brock (G) 7-26 4-4 3 3 13 21
Jr. Brock (F) 5-14 2-5 1 3 15 12
Turner (C) 4-16 1-2 4 1 3 10
DeDreu (F) 1-5 4-10 2 1 6 6
Messer (G) 1-6 3-4 3 9 3 5
Thies 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0
Thompson 0-0 0-0 0 2 0 0
Team -- -- -- -- 5 --
Totals 18-67 14-25 13 19 45 54
Three-point goals -ÊTriton 5-11 (Nifong 3-6, Ganshorn 1-3, Feldman 1-1, Senff 0-1), Rising Sun 4-16 (Ja. Brock 3-6, Turner 1-5, DeDreu 0-3, Jr. Brock 0-2). Turnovers - Rising Sun 14, Triton 21. Fouled out -ÊSenff, Speicher, Ganshorn. Total fouls - Triton 22, Rising Sun 13. Officials -ÊNorm Delph, Doug Bauman.
Records -ÊTriton 20-7, Rising Sun 25-3 [[In-content Ad]]