Marseilles Tournament: Reed-Custer tops Putnam County 54-51 to capture third place

MARSEILLES - It’s hard to know what you’re going to get in a third-place game.

Normally just 24 hours or so removed from seeing a chance to play for the title dashed, teams have to regroup, switch gears and set a new goal ... finishing out the tournament with a win.

Both Reed-Custer and Putnam County put together a pretty good prelude to Thursday night’s title game of the 12th Annual Marseilles Holiday Tournament, as the Comets took advantage of a couple of late turnovers by the Panthers and hit 5-of-6 free throws down the stretch to capture third place with a 54-51 triumph at Marseilles Elementary School.

“This whole week our effort has been good, and we’ve guarded hard, but we just made a few too many bad decisions,” said Putnam County coach Harold Fay, his club ending the tournament 2-2 to put its season mark at 9-10. “Tonight it was a reach-in here or a bad pass there. I bet we gave them 20 points at the free-throw line.

“If we take away a few of the mistakes we made tonight, especially late, in a game that ended up a three-point game, who knows?”

Putnam County held a 43-42 lead with just under six minutes to play before a free throw each by Reed-Custer’s Chris Hill and Lucas Foote, plus the latter’s 3-pointer from the right corner three minutes later, made it 47-43. Two free throws and a layup by Jackson McDonald, then a pair of free tosses by Drake Smith kept the deficit at two, but three charity tosses by Foote around a PC turnover helped the Comets close out the win.

McDonald finished with a team-best 19 points and 10 rebounds, while all-tournament selection Austin Mattingly posted 14 points, four rebounds and two steals for the Panthers, which shot 17-of-43 (40%) from the field and won the rebounding battle 38-33, but suffered 19 turnovers, 13 in the second half.

“Putnam County has a really nice team that is athletic, and they have some kids that can really score off the bounce, but I thought we played a pretty good game on the defensive end,” said Reed-Custer coach Mark Porter, his squad meshing 13-of-39 (33%) from the field and 20-of-34 (59%) from the line. “I was really proud of Jace Christian tonight. He was the one chasing McDonald all over the place and maybe held him under his average, but if not, made him earn the points he got. Stopping, or at least slowing down, McDonald was a big key for us.”

Reed-Custer received a game-high 27 points and three steals from Foote, an all-tournament honoree, with Hill adding eight points and eight rebounds.

“The kid we’ve been wanting to step forward is Lucas Foote, and he did tonight,” Porter said. “When we needed a basket, Lucas got it for us. We were able to get him the ball in the post a couple times, but they took that away in the second half. But whenever we needed him to, he went and got the ball, and he knew we wanted him to have the ball in his hands late.

“To come here and go 3-1 and win third, we’re pretty happy with that.”

The Panthers trailed 14-12 after the opening period, but used an electrifying finish to hold a 30-28 lead at halftime. Trailing 28-24 in the final seconds, Mattingly nailed a triple from the left corner, then stole the ball at half-court before swishing a 35-foot shot at the horn to give his club a 30-28 lead.

Reed-Custer used a 11-5 third quarter to lead 39-35 heading to the fourth before Putnam County put together an 8-2 spurt to start the frame.

“We didn’t execute our offense the past two games as well as we did in the first two,” Fay said. “We also didn’t do as good of job as I know we can in rebounding. We had way too many times where we just didn’t secure the ball and weren’t strong with it. Reed-Custer is a big, strong team, but we still should have rebounded better than we did.”

Putnam County next hosts Midland on Jan. 4 at 7 p.m. in a Tri-County Conference tilt, while Reed-Custer visits Illinois Central Eight foe Wilmington the same night at 6:45 p.m.