COLUMBUS — Perry marched into unexplored territory but the prime parcel of real estate belonged to The Wellington School when the Jaguars beat the Commodores 68-47 in a Division IV semifinal in the boys state basketball tournament Thursday night.
With 6-foot, 9-inch Dustin Harder and 6-7 Noah Berry in its lineup, Wellington presented Perry with a challenge it had not had to contend with on its way to its first appearance in a boys state basketball tournament.
The Jaguars owned the lane and took Perry out of its comfort zone after the Commodores got off to a blazing start and grabbed a 9-0 lead just over two minutes into the game.
But, with Perry leading 18-13 after one quarter, the game shifted dramatically in Wellington’s direction when it ran off 13 unanswered points to start the second quarter to take a 26-18 lead.
By halftime, the Jaguars were up 32-23 and never led by fewer than 10 points the last 14 minutes of the game..
Solomon Pierre-Louis led Wellington (20-7) with 16 points and Harder tied a Division IV state semifinal record with 21 rebounds. Orion Monford’s 19 points led Perry (24-4) and Plummie Gardner scored 14 points.
“They’re good. They’re athletic and they’re so long they can get you out of what you want to do,” Perry coach Matt Tabler said.
“When you’ve got to go against 6-9 and 6-7, it’s going to affect your shot. We’re not accustomed to playing height like that and it affected our shots. It’s hard to find shots out on the floor when you’ve got that kind of height,” Monford said. “Their size is so much different in person than it is on film.”
Perry was 17 of 67 on field goals (26 percent) and was 8 of 28 on 3-pointers. Wellington hit 49 percent on field goals.
Wellington coach Artie Taylor said, “With our length we can cover a lot of real estate with our arms out.”
He also pointed to his team’s depth as a factor in coming from behind to win by 21 points. Perry played seven in its rotation and Wellington put nine players on the floor. Perry got three points from its bench and Wellington got 14 points.
“Obviously, we didn’t start off the game the way we wanted to but these guys just stayed poised,” Taylor said. “They never blinked their eyes and just kept grinding it out one possession at a time until we started get into our rhythm and started getting the ball to our sweet spots and started making them (Perry) play some half court.”
Looking back at the season, Tabler said, “Obviously, it was a terrific season for us. What these seniors have done has been remarkable.
“We came out with a lot of energy but I think their overall athleticism wore on us,” he said.
The Commodores’ run to the state tournament brought the Perry community closer in a time of tragedy after the death of assistant coach Herb Lane Jr., which Gardner alluded to in the post-game press conference.
“We’ve had a tough few weeks but we knew we definitely had the community behind us,” he said.
Monford said, “Although the season didn’t end the way we wanted it to, we opened a door for future Perry teams. But it hurts right now.”
Tabler said he told the team to react to the loss however they wanted to react individually and said he left them with one final thought.
“The last thing we said to the kids was don’t be sad it’s over, be glad it happened,” he said.
.neFileBlock {
margin-bottom: 20px;
}
.neFileBlock p {
margin: 0px 0px 0px 0px;
}
.neFileBlock .neFile {
border-bottom: 1px dotted #aaa;
padding-bottom: 5px;
padding-top: 10px;
}
.neFileBlock .neCaption {
font-size: 85%;
}
