BOURBON - When Clay Yeo plays with confidence, Triton boys basketball coach Jason Groves said he is an excellent basketball player.
That was evident Tuesday evening, as the 6-foot-3 freshman scored 16 of his game-high 22 points in the third quarter and helped the Class 1A No. 3 Trojans to a 74-42 win over Michigan City Marquette in the opening round of Sectional 50."He played extremely well," Groves said of Yeo, who finished the game 9 of 12 from the field, 4 of 4 from the free throw line, and also grabbed eight rebounds. "When he plays with confidence, he's an excellent basketball player, and he played with confidence tonight."
Yeo's offensive output in the third quarter helped Triton turn what had been a close game into a yawner.
The Trojans, who struggled offensively for the majority of the first half, led 13-10 after the first quarter and 26-19 at halftime.
After shooting 8 of 23 (35 percent) from the field in the first half, Triton played like a completely different team in the third and fourth quarters, hitting 16 of 22 (73 percent) shots from the field and 14 of 17 (82 percent) free throws.
"Offensively, I don't know what we were doing," Groves said of his team's first-half performance. "We shot the ball quick, we didn't reverse it. I don't know what we were doing."
While the state-ranked Trojans, who are trying to advance to the state championship game for the third-straight year, didn't play as well as they normally do, Marquette coach Jason Hawkins was very pleased with the way his team played in the early going.
"The first 12 minutes of the game is the best we've played all season," said Hawkins. "If we would play like we did in the first half, we'd probably have a few more wins."
The other 20 minutes of the game, however, belonged to Triton. And after the Trojans trailed 19-18 midway through the second quarter, they closed the second quarter on an 8-0 run and outscored the Blazers 56-24 the rest of the way.
"They did the little things," Hawkins said when asked what Triton did differently in the second half. "They're No. 3 in the state. They took great shots. We were up four with three minutes to go in the first half, then they went on their run."
With the win, Triton improved to 20-2 on the season and advanced to Friday's semifinal game against Marshall County rival Argos (11-9).
Triton hosted and defeated Argos 50-30 on Feb. 2.
"No matter where we play it, or when we play it, it's a fun game," Groves said of Argos. "It's a county rivalry. They're well-coached, and the (Scott) Sanders kid is a great player."
Marquette finished its season with an 8-12 record and lost seven of its last nine games.
Friday's second semifinal game will feature South Central (16-6) and Oregon-Davis (4-15).
South Central advanced by beating Westville 65-24 in Tuesday's second game.
To go with Yeo's performance, Triton also got great play from freshman Quentyn Carpenter, who came off the bench to score 11 points, finishing the game 4 of 5 from the field overall and 3 of 4 from three-point range.
Juniors Jake Everett and Blake Lemler scored nine points each, while senior Curtis Nordmann finished with seven points.
In all, Triton's bench outscored Marquette's reserves 38-3.
"Those kids work their tails off, and it's nice to see different people doing things," Groves said of his bench. "We had a lot of different people do things."
Senior point guard Ben Montalbano scored four points and dished out eight assists, while junior Griffyn Carpenter scored three points on 1-of-7 shooting.
Marquette was led by Tucker Miller's 16 points. Joey Przyblinski added 10 points, while Mat Johnson scored eight points for the Blazers, who finished the game 16 of 41 (39 percent) from the field overall and 6 of 19 (32 percent) from three-point range.
