Boys basketball: Princeton overcomes slow start at Kewanee, tops Boilermakers

KEWANEE – Kewanee’s Brockman Gymnasium never has been an easy place to play for Princeton or any Boilermakers opponent.

On Tuesday night, the Boilermakers lived up to that tradition early, leading the No. 3 state-ranked Tigers 14-11 at the end of the first quarter and 19-16 early in the second.

The Tigers outscored the Boilers 20-7 to close out the second quarter for a 36-26 halftime lead and then really took off in the third quarter.

They opened the second half with a 17-0 run and outscored the Boilermakers 30-7 in the third quarter and raced away with a 78-48 victory with a running clock in play for the fourth quarter.

“This is a tough place to play. Feels like the crowd is on top of you. I knew they were going to come at us,” Princeton coach Jason Smith said. “We talked about them having a run at the beginning of the third quarter because they feed into the crowd and the longer they stay in it, the more the crowd becomes a factor. Couldn’t have asked for a better run than that. 30-7. Holy cow.”

“We had the mentality, ‘We win the first two minutes, we win the game.’ We just blew it open. What was it, 30 by the end of the third quarter?” Princeton senior Grady Thompson said. “Just moving the ball, getting the open lanes and hitting some open shots.”

The Tigers improved to 14-0 overall, 3-0 in conference.

Thompson scored 28 points, Teegan Davis had 15 and Noah LaPorte added 11.

Princeton erased the Kewanee lead quickly with 9-0 run in less than two minutes of play in the second quarter to turn a 19-16 deficit into a 25-19 lead.

The Boilers scored only to have the Tigers follow with seven straight on the way to a 36-26 halftime lead with Thompson netting 11 points in the second quarter.

Thompson said having the Boilermakers challenge them so early as they did “helps us to learn how to work under pressure and play in those kind of situations.”

The fun was just beginning for the boys in blue.

They ripped off the first 17 points of the third quarter, capped by a Kolten Monroe dunk. Thompson and Davis followed with dunks of their own, and Thompson finished out the 30-7 onslaught with a 3-pointer and a buzzer-beater with a basket on the break from an assist by Korte Lawson.

“I think our defense fueled our offense. When we lock down defensively and then play unselfish, we’re a pretty good ball team,” Smith said. “If we go through the motions, I think we’re a good ball team, but if we do those things really right, we’re a really good ball team.”

Thompson said the Tigers’ defense played a big factor in getting their offense going.

“Good stops lead to points. By the time we were up 20, I think they were defeated,” he said.

Smith said the Boilers did a nice job disguising their defense.

“It was hard for us to know what they were in defensively, so we could set up our offense,” he said. “The kids started figuring it out. Got the ball inside. Noah LaPorte made some nice decisions cutting to the basket. Korte [Lawson] was spraying the ball all over the place feeding the guys. We were clicking on all cylinders in the third quarter.”

Brady Clark led his dad’s Boilers with 17 points, and Blaise Lewis added 10.

Notes: In the sophomore prelim, Jordan Reinhardt scored 28 points to lead the Kittens to a 58-52 victory over the Riveters. Tyler Forristall added 10 points for the Kittens (11-2).