L-P, Fieldcrest to play for Saturday’s Colmone Classic championship

SPRING VALLEY - LaSalle-Peru and Fieldcrest played their way in to Saturday’s championship game of the 50th annual Colmone Classic with wins in the pool crossover bracket finals on Friday night at Hall High School.

The Cavs came back to beat the Rockets 57-56 while the Knights beat HOIC rival Eureka 57-50 in the nightcap.

They will meet for the championship at 7:30 p.m. Saturday. The Rockets and Hornets will play for third place at 6 p.m.

“It’s a really good feeling because I know we haven’t been there for a while,” L-P coach John Senica said. “I’m happy for the kids and proud of them for hard they’ve played the last three games. They deserve to be where they’re at tomorrow.”

Fieldcrest is the defending champions, seeking its 14th Colmone Classic crown.

“Honored that the boys earned a championship game berth. We love this tournament and have a lot of respect and appreciation for the great people that run it,” Fieldcrest coach Jeremy Hahn said. “Going to be a great night against a tremendous LaSalle-Peru team.”

L-P has never won the Colmone Classic, reaching the finals in 2021 and falling 66-62 to Princeton.

Hall beat Princeton 56-46 in Friday’s opener. The Red Devils (5-3) will face Kewanee in the fifth-place game at 4:30 p.m. while the Tigers (3-5) will draw Mendota in a 7th-place matchup at 3 p.m.

“It was a good win and I thought we deserved it,” Hall coach Mike Filiippini said. “In tournaments like this, we told them ‘you can celebrate until you wake up tomorrow and then you better watch film on Kewanee.’

L-P 57, Rock Falls 56: The Rockets took a 43-38 lead into the fourth quarter, but the Cavs outscored them 19-13 down the stretch to take the win.

Senica said the keys for the Cavs were defense and rebounding.

“Rock Falls is a really good ball club and they’ve got some shooters. They got some shots off but I think our guys did a really job contesting them and holding them to their average,” he said.

The Cavs coach said reaching the championship game really wasn’t quite on the Cavs’ radar just yet.

“We take one game at a time,” he said. “Nothing’s on the radar until the next game in front of us. That’s how these kids want to play. That’s what they told me. They want to play one possession at a time. We’re going to play every possession like it’s our last. So there’s no sense looking forward.”

Senica said Mikey Hartman “probably played the best game I’ve seen him play,” leading the Cavs with 26 points and playing strong defense.

Nick Olivero added 16 points.

Kuitim Heald had 19 points for the Rockets and Christian Hernandez had 13.

Fieldcrest 57, IVC 50: Ed Lorton, who was one eight Fieldcrest players in the scoring column, led the Knights with 23 points.

Layten Gerdes had seven points and Jordan Heider and Eli Gerdes added six each.

Kahn said the Knights played a well-rounded game.

“I thought tonight we were as connected and unselfish as we’ve been all season,” he said. “Really liked the defensive intensity throughout the game. Eureka is an elite 3-point shooting team and we knew we were going to have to stay connected. Offensively, we found some open looks and all 8 guys that played got in the scoring column.”

Hall 56, Princeton 46: The Red Devils used a 13-0 run to go up 29-15 in the second quarter, settling for a 30-21 halftime lead.

Jayden Fulkerson momentarily gave the Tigers a 37-36 lead only to have Greyson Bickett (13 points) wipe it out with two treys of his own to send the Red Devils to a 44-39 lead at quarter’s end.

Braden Curran scored eight of his team-high 14 points in the fourth quarter as the Red Devils pulled away to a 10-point win.

“We played well, but obviously they’re missing their 6-7 guy (Noah LaPorte). I’m not going to feel sorry for Smitty (PHS coach Jason Smith). They have farms of 6-7 guys in Princeton, Ill.,” Hall coach Mike Filippini said.

“We made a run. They hit some shots. Hats off to them. They deserved to win,” Smith said.

With LaPorte nursing a foot injury, the Tigers turned to Jordan Reinhardt to carry the load. He scored 23 points despite a lot of attention from the Red Devils.

“We had a couple of different plans for Reinhardt,” Filippini said. “We thought face-guarding would do good, but we didn’t want to do it until the second half. We thought that snuck and we just ended up playing straight up. thought we had good help defense. He’s a good player, but I thought we really made him work for his points. I thought we kind of wore him out.”

Smith said the Tigers have to do do better not having LaPorte available.

“We practice without him. Not an excuse. Got to get better. I’ve got to get better coaching them without Noah,” he said.

Freshman Chase Sterling chipped in eight points for Hall while Fulkerson had eight points and Asa Gartin had seven for PHS.

The Hall sophomores defeated Fieldcrest 51-45 to punch their ticket in to Saturday’s finals against Kewanee, who beat Mendota 39-31.

Note: In other Saturday matchups, Bureau Valley and Putnam County will play for 11th place at noon and St. Bede and IVC will play for ninth place at 1:30 p.m.