By Cary Stemle
New Albany’s Jim Shannon has coached a lot of games — 815, to be exact (hat tip to the News and Tribune’s Josh Cook for the precise figures).
But he doesn’t recall ever suiting up zero seniors.
Saturday night at the Doghouse, the unexpected occurred, as forward Julien Hunter (injured) and Trey Hourigan (suspended) were sidelined. In their practice sweat suits, the Dogs’ lone seniors could only corral rebounds in warmups and offer moral support from the bench during the game.
It didn’t matter. Led by sophomore guards Tucker Biven (career-high 32 points) and Kaden Stanton (16 points), the Bulldogs (1-1) jumped on Evansville Harrison (1-3) early and never let up. The 68-43 win was Shannon’s 400th at New Albany and brings his lifetime victory total to 565 over 36 seasons against 250 losses.
“It just means you’ve been coaching a long time,” Shannon said of reaching the 400-win mark, laughing. “We’ve had some great players here.”
Biven, who’s said to have secured a baseball scholarship to the University of Louisville, had the kind of game players dream about. Scoring from distance, mid-range, on drives and on the break, he shot 11-of-18 from the field overall, including 4-of-8 from three-point range and 6-of-9 from the free-throw line. Late in the game the 6-1 guard had a mini-highlight reel. He nearly flushed a put-back, had a perfect lob to Jordan Thomas for a dunk, and followed with a two-hand dunk after a steal.
“(Biven) played good defense, rebounded, shot the ball extremely well,” Shannon said. “He’s awful tough for a sophomore.”
New Albany was coming off a season-opening blowout loss at No. 2 Bloomington South, and given the short-handed nature of the roster and the team’s overall youth (three sophomores and two juniors started Saturday night), Shannon and his staff had to strike a fine balance.
“We bounced back after getting absolutely shellacked last weekend, and it kinda hurt our confidence, obviously,” Shannon said. “We had to find a way to get the kids to play harder this week in practice without humiliating them to the point that they lose all their confidence. It’s a tough wire to walk. You have to go at them because they didn’t play hard. They got punched last week and didn’t punch back.
“Tonight we told them we’re doing the punching, and I thought we were more physical. … I thought all of them played well and improved as a team. It was a good bounce back for us.”
Junior center Thomas scored 6 points and grabbed 10 rebounds for New Albany, while junior foreward Charlie Carr scored 8. “(Carr) did an outstanding job helping us survive these last couple weeks,” Shannon said.
New Albany visits Floyd Central (4-0) on Friday, and plays host to Zionsville (1-1 with a victory over No. 9 Carmel) on Saturday. Hourigan is set to return against Floyd, while Hunter needs at least a couple more weeks to heal the stress fracture in his foot, Shannon said.
Evansville Harrison 9 11 10 15-45
New Albany 18 14 23 13-68
Evansville Harrison (1-3): Mason Bost 4, Jahni Summers 2, Terrence Ringo 14, Ja’Twan Watson 3, Kevin Langley 17, Deonta Johnson 2, Jordan Hart 3.
New Albany (1-1): Kaden Stanton 16, Maddox Schmelz 4, Tucker Biven 32, Charlie Carr 8, Jordan Thomas 6, Jackson Streander 2.
3-point field goals: Evansville Harrison 6 (Langley 5, Hart), New Albany 4 (Biven 4).
